Gone McMadd
by LucretiaDecoy
Summary: They survived the DMP, they endured the Chojin Crown and they destroyed The Anarchists; but now the Muscle League must face their toughest challenge to date: reality television. Rated for violence, obscenity, and disturbing imagery: read at your own peril
1. Dawning of a New Era

**A/N:** This is (yet another) sequel to my sprawling UM series of fics, but can easily be read as a stand-alone fic. Got the idea for this from that Big Brother game that keeps circulating in emails (which never, ever gets any less hilarious).

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Ultimate Muscle, which nowadays is probably something of a wonder, since I have probably written more about the series than Yudetamago (the real owners) have. 

-

* * *

-

**Chapter 1 – Dawning of a New Era**

Jacqueline sighed, rolling her eyes to the ceiling.

"It is not straightforward!" Vance barked across his desk at her.

"Yes it is," she said plainly, keeping her eyes on a small stain on the ceiling above them. "Ikeman made a disastrous job of managing the Bad Blood Tournament, I made the Jacqueline McMadd Chojin Crown a raging success, therefore I am clearly the better choice to run the IWF as chairman."

"Chairwoman," Vance corrected her.

Jacqueline's green eyes rolled downwards to lock onto her elderly father.

"We both know that I am more man than Ikeman ever has been," she said flatly.

Vance sighed, rubbing his fingers at his temples.

"Wrestling is a man's business," he said slowly. "Kevin Mask said so himself."

"I have Kevin Mask wrapped around my little finger and firmly under my thumb," Jacqueline smugly replied. "The Muscle League actually give a damn about what I have to say. They all despise Ikeman just as much as you and I despise his face."

"It is a shockingly unattractive face that your brother has, but he's been involved in the business for over twenty years, he has the benefit of experience over you," Vance said patiently.

"His ideas are old, just like you," Jacqueline spat venomously. "You both agreed that I have better salesmanship and I am more liked by and more in touch with today's wrestling fans! I can turn this business upside-down in a matter of weeks. Ikeman just turns people's stomachs with his face and his hair and his clothes and his voice and his… Ugh!"

"Your brother has a great voice for karaoke! He's always been karaoke queen wherever we went!"

"Karaoke queen?"

"Did I say queen? I meant to say queer."

Jacqueline arched her eyebrows, suppressing an amused smirk with great effort as she watched her father frown a little, pondering what he had just said.

"King," he eventually corrected himself. "Karaoke king. Your brother is always karaoke king."

"Freudian slip, I'm sure," Jacqueline quipped.

Vance chuckled a little and Jacqueline allowed herself to smile.

"No!" Vance hurriedly corrected himself, straightening out his grin. "No, no, no! I won't have a woman sitting in this chair!"

"I would replace that chair with something more functional," Jacqueline snootily returned. "And I would revamp this building, so much wasted space… We could sublet some of the lesser used offices to local businesses, charge extortionate rent and invite fans in to shop there, provided we get a cut for every sale made."

"Jacqueline, that's…" Vance began, shaking his head slowly. "Well, frankly, that's just brutal."

"Not as brutal as subjecting our fans – our source of income – to Ikeman's face for the next ten years."

"Would you two stop talking about me as though I'm not even in the room?" Ikeman protested, standing abruptly.

Jacqueline puffed her cheeks, rolling her eyes again.

"I have no solid proof that you could really achieve even half of your ambitious targets, Jacqueline," Vance said slowly.

"Check the profit and loss accounts for the Chojin Crown!" Jacqueline snapped.

"So I'm going to recommend to the shareholders that you be made temporary president of the IWF," Vance continued. "I'm going to give you until the end of quarter two to prove to me – and the board – that you really are the better choice to lead the IWF."

"Quarter two?" Jacqueline echoed.

"I know!" Ikeman wailed, nodding his head at her. "Father, that's the end of June!"

"Exactly!" Jacqueline growled. "And this is already the first week of March! You're giving me less than four months!"

"Which ought to be sufficient," Vance said with finality, crossing his arms over his broad chest and sitting back in his chair. "The Chojin Crown was created and run – from prelims to the final – in less than four months."

Jacqueline let out an exasperated sigh, scowling at her elder brother as she caught him grinning smugly at her.

"Just you wait, Ikeman!" she sneered. "I'll show you exactly how to run this business!"

-

* * *

-

"You're very quiet," Kevin Mask said carefully. "Which is really not like you. Dare I ask: what have you done this time, Mars?"

"Hey!" Mars yelped defensively. "I ain't done nothin'! Da old man had problems long before I started workin' wid him."

Kevin slowly pulled the phone from his ear, eying it warily. He began to think that he did not actually want to know what Mars was talking about this time, but the idea that Mars was on the other side of the world – living in Tokyo with Kiki – reassured him that at least this time he would not be dragged into sorting out whatever mess Mars had created, and so he could at least safely ask about it.

"Explain," he said, bringing the phone back to his ear.

"Well, ya know, we been livin' here for a couple o' months now, and after Kiki got a job, I felt real bad sitting at home all day while everybody else went out to work," Mars began. "So I told Kiki's old man I was gonna look for a job, and he offered me a position workin' wid him."

Kevin stiffened, his face twisting.

"What does Kiki's father do?" he asked monotonously, already dreading the reply.

"He's a production manager at da Bank o' Japan," Mars replied.

"Oh, alright," Kevin said, his relief more evident in his tone than he had intended for it to be. "So he offered you a job as a security guard, right?"

"Nah, he gave me a job workin' in quality control."

Kevin's face dropped.

"Quality control?" he repeated.

"Yeah," Mars agreed. "But it was real borin', ya know. I had been dere so long I just got bored and decided to have a bit o' fun. And den when Kiki's old man found out, he had a heart attack. Now, everybody is sayin' it's my fault da old man is in hospital, but I didn't do nothin'. He was a real soft type long before da ass incident."

Kevin cringed, silently thanking every God he could think of that Mars no longer lived in London with him.

"The "ass incident"?" he asked patiently.

"Yeah," Mars agreed. "Like I said, da job got borin' real quick."

"How quick?"

"I'd been dere for about two hours."

Kevin rolled his eyes.

"And alls I'm doin' is watchin' lots o' money spittin' out of a printer," Mars continued. "So I found da room where dey produce da images dat go on da notes. Da guy dere asked if I could just wait dere while he went for a coffee, so I decided to play a little joke on him."

Kevin tensed, his brain warning him that what was coming next was inevitable.

"So I scanned my ass and sent it to da printer," Mars said, as though to do so had been the perfectly natural thing to do in such a circumstance. "Only I kinda moved my leg a little cause da guy was comin' back wid his coffee, and what got printed onto da money showed most of my–"

"Mars, please," Kevin stopped him. "It's nine in the morning over here, I've just had breakfast, I'd like to keep it in my stomach, thank you very much."

"So anyways, Kiki's old man is in hospital now, and everybody is pointin' at me," Mars said. "Da weird part is, Kid Muscle asked if he could keep da notes wid my ass on dem."

Kevin's eyes widened.

"I don't want to know," he said flatly. "Sometimes nine time zones just isn't far enough away."

"Hey, it ain't exactly da sweet life for me over here," Mars protested. "I got Kiki chewin' my ass out over her old man, and den we got dat invite from Terry and Trixie, and now she's really on my case!"

"Oh, right, I'd forgotten about that…" Kevin muttered, his eyes flicking to the frilled white card propped up on the mantelpiece at his side. "Another wedding… Only this time it's a rootin', tootin', barnyard hoedown in the heart of cowboy country."

"Yeah, so I was thinkin', we really oughta do somethin' about dis," Mars replied.

"What do you suggest?" Kevin asked, smirking a little. "Should we jump on the bandwagon? Our fellow Justice Chojins are all getting married, maybe it's time you and I finally settled down too. What do you say Mars? Will you make an honourable woman out of me?"

Kevin stifled laughter as the line went deathly silent.

"You're a cheeky bastard, Kevin Mask," Mars eventually said, his voice oddly quiet and smooth.

"Your wondering eye has always been the downfall of our relationship Mars," Kevin added. "And now here you are handing out pictures of your most intimate body parts to Kid Muscle, what am I to think?"

"Hey, it was a good joke, I was puttin' my moneymaker on da money!"

Kevin sighed, shaking his head.

"Ya miss me, don't ya Mask?" Mars laughed.

"Not really, but I do pity Kiki," Kevin replied.

"Yeah… So anyways, I was just thinkin', until all dis whole ass incident passes by maybe I could just come live wid you–"

"Absolutely no way."

"Cause you're my buddy, and you always help me out when I need–"

"Absolutely no way."

"You miss da humour."

"Not that much I don't."

"I would just–"

"Goodbye Mars."

"Kevin!"

Kevin hung up the phone, smiling to himself at Mars's predicament. He turned and started down the hall, slowing as he spotted Amy staring at a sheet of paper, the worried look on her face making him feel suddenly uneasy.

"What is it?" he asked, already sure that he did not actually want to know the answer.

"You've been summoned to The Philippines by order of the IWF headquarters," she replied, turning the page around to show him the contents. "It says you're needed for an upcoming event. What upcoming event? Did Mars know anything about this?"

"He never mentioned it," Kevin muttered, taking the page from Amy and scanning through it for himself. "It can't be anything too awful," he concluded. "Mars only spoke about how his arse gave Kiki's father a heart attack, so obviously he doesn't consider this high priority."

Amy frowned at Kevin, searching his eyes for the joke.

"Do I even want to know why Mars's arse gave Kiki's dad a heart attack?" she asked cautiously.

"No, you really don't," Kevin assured her, shaking his head. "But I suppose I should check this out. Can you take me to the airport?"

"What, now?" Amy echoed. "But… Right now? It was just that I needed to–"

"I just want to get there, get through it, and get back as soon as possible," Kevin replied.

Amy sighed and nodded her understanding.

"You're right," she agreed. "I'm sure you won't be gone long. After all, how bad can it possibly be, right?"

Kevin's face dropped.

"Don't ever say that," he warned her. "At least, not when you're talking about the IWF, because no matter how bad you may think it might be, it is always, always so very much worse!"

Amy smiled, but Kevin shook his head.

"Seriously," he insisted. "Always worse."

Amy pulled a sceptical face at him, but Kevin ignored her, heading off to pack a bag.

-

* * *

-

"Okay, now shut-up!" Mars snapped, quickening his pace.

"But Mars!" Kid wailed, hurrying after him. "Wait for me!"

Mars took longer, faster strides, hoping to lose Kid in the crowds of Singapore Changi Airport. It was bad enough that he had been summoned by the IWF to fly out to The Philippines via Singapore for no apparent reason, but after having to endure the flight from Tokyo with Kid wedging him against the window of the plane, Mars found his head becoming flooded with homicidal thoughts. Hurrying through the main lounge and leaping over ponds of brightly coloured Koi, Mars heard Kid's cries fade behind him, and, to his relief, he finally spotted the blue iron mask of his longest friend.

"Kev!" he yelled, launching himself off the raised planted area.

"Bloody hell Mars!" Kevin greeted him.

"Hey Mars," Terry said with a nod of his head. "Any idea why we're here, and why they're sendin' us to Manila?"

Mars shook his head.

"You had to fly here with Kid Muscle, didn't you?" Dik Dik asked, smirking at Mars.

"Kiss my ass, Bambi!" Mars shot back.

"Your ass is famous, Mars!" Jaeger said cheerfully. "I heard it vas printed on ze five thousand Yen note!"

Mars growled, slapping a hand against his forehead.

"It's a ridiculous state of affairs," Kevin commented. "The IWF can't just send all eight of us on a blind mission to The Philippines without good reason."

"That's assuming that there is a good reason for us all going out there," Dik Dik pointed out.

"Hey, everybody's here!" Kid Muscle cheered as he joined the group. "This is awesome, let's get drunk and play the King Game!"

"Or not…" Dik Dik said darkly, glancing at a pair of security guards eying Kid suspiciously.

"We don't know where we're heading, or what we're facing," Kevin pointed out. "We need to remain alert."

"Yeah, but us Kinnikus have a saying for situations like this," Kid replied.

The others all looked at Kid with varying degrees of wariness, but he grinned obliviously and continued his speech.

"When in deadly danger, when beset by doubt…"

The others began to look a little more reassured by Kid's unusually serious tone and almost poetic words.

"Run in little circles, wave your arms and shout!" Kid finished, charging around the others with his arms in the air.

"Idiot," Kevin grumbled.

"Hey, where's Meat?" Terry asked, looking around the others. "Shouldn't he be here holdin' onto Kid's leash?"

"Meat wasn't invited," Kid said, pushing his way into the centre of the group. "Jacqueline said it had to just be the eight of us, absolutely nobody else."

"Is anyone else as worried as I am?" Wally asked nervously.

"We don't have time to be worried," Kevin cut him off.

The others turned to him expectantly, but his head was turned to one side. They all followed the direction he appeared to be looking, finding the monitor announcing flight schedules, which informed them that their next flight was boarding.

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* * *

-

"Everything is working out perfectly," Jacqueline said, a slightly maniacal grin tugging at her features, the sight of which caused her father and brother to cower back from her. "They're onboard the flight now and it's only a matter of time before we go live with the show. This will be the dawning of a new era for the IWF."

Ikeman gulped, turning to his father, who shook his head violently.

"Sister, I don't think that the Muscle Leaguers are going to like starring in your new show," Ikeman said regardless.

Vance squeaked and tried to flee the room, tripping over as Ikeman clutched at him fearfully.

"I hope they don't," Jacqueline said casually. "It will make for better viewing."

"Miss McMadd, we're ready for you," a voice called into the room.

Jacqueline rose smoothly from her seat and left the room, upon which Vance and Ikeman sighed in relief.

"She is terrifying!" Vance hissed.

"She gets that from you!" Ikeman wailed.

Meanwhile, Jacqueline positioned herself in front of a green screen, allowing an assistant to attach a microphone to her as the production crew set up the cameras, lighting and microphones around her.

"And we go live in ten… nine…"

"Get away!" Jacqueline snapped, shooing the assistants from her sides.

"Eight… Seven…"

Jacqueline licked her teeth and primped her hair a little, turning in the direction of the camera with a red light illuminated above it.

"Six… Five…"

Jacqueline took a deep breath.

"Four…"

She watched the crew countdown the last three seconds with their fingers before flashing a brilliant smile at the camera as a sign on the wall behind it lit up to read "On Air".

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, I'm Jacqueline McMadd, chairman of the IWF, and today I have a very special treat for all you wrestling fans," she said. "Today is the very first episode of our brand new show, _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_!"

Jacqueline extended a hand to the green screen behind her.

"Right now, a plane carrying your favourite wrestlers of the Muscle League is headed towards a remote desert island in the South Pacific, where our heroes will spend the next eight weeks!"

Jacqueline took her hand down again.

"Only the strongest will survive, but who will it be?" she squealed excitedly. "Only you, the fans, can answer that question! Eight Chojins: Kevin Mask, Mars, Kid Muscle, Jaeger, Checkmate, Terry Kenyon, Dik Dik Van Dik and Wally Tusket will be subjected to trials for food and shelter, and each week, they will nominate their two weakest links. You the viewers can then call in to the show to vote who you would most like to see off the island, until only one man remains! Fight fans, welcome to _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_!"

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* * *

-

"This turbulence is unreasonable," Dik Dik moaned. "I'm going to have a word with the pilot."

Kid Muscle was strapped into his seat crying hysterically, Wally was trying to manoeuvre around the puddle of urine Kid had created to take his seat next to the Kinniku prince, Jaeger and Terry were sat together looking a little ill, Checkmate was fastening his seatbelt and Mars and Kevin Mask were both taking their seats.

"Too much shakin' about…" Mars muttered, twitching a little.

"Throw up in that direction!" Kevin yelled at him, pushing him away.

An inhuman scream brought silence to all seven Chojins, who exchanged worried looks as the interior of the plane was suddenly flooded with whirling winds.

"The pilot!" Dik Dik cried, running back to the others. "He's gone!"

"What do you mean "gone"?" Kevin echoed.

"I mean he ejected his seat and we are free-falling towards the sea!" Dik Dik replied, jabbing a finger at the window by Kevin's side.

Kevin smacked his masked face against the window, his eyes widening as he saw that Dik Dik's ludicrous statement was in fact the truth.

"Always, always worse," he grumbled.

-

* * *

-

**Next Chapter:** The plane carrying the Muscle League crash-lands, and our heroes learn that it was no accident, as they have been deliberately abandoned on a remote desert island as part of a new reality television series dreamt up by the IWF; but just how will our heroes manage to survive eight weeks with no cow and rice, no television, no karaoke, no girls, no shelter, no gym to work off all that anger and only each other for company? **Chapter 2 – The Ruse**.


	2. The Ruse

**A/N:**_Campfire Song_ from SpongeBob SquarePants.

**Recap:** The Muscle League were summoned to go on a "mission", but were sent hurtling towards a desert island as part of a reality television programme born out of Jacqueline McMadd's warped mind in her bid to prove herself as a successful chairman of the IWF.

* * *

**Chapter 2 – The Ruse**

"I can't swim! I can't swim!"

Wally turned to Kid, who was fighting desperately to remain afloat.

"I'll save you, Kid!" he called, before diving under the water and rapidly swimming through the debris littering the waves to reach Kid.

"Son of a bitch!" Mars cursed as he dragged himself ashore.

"Vot vill ve do now?" Jaeger asked, before removing his helmet and shaking the water from his hair.

"This place looks deserted," Dik Dik commented.

"A desert island?" Terry echoed. "Dang Dik Dik, don't even joke about somethin' like that!"

"Hath anyone seen the pilot?" Checkmate asked as he shook his arms, spraying seawater about himself.

"I don't like this…" Kevin muttered, slowly surveying his surroundings.

"Ya think it really is a desert island?" Terry asked.

"It may look that way," Kevin began, walking a few steps forward. "But if this island is deserted, how do you explain those tracks?"

Kevin pointed at the ground in front of his feet and the others all looked down, their heads slowly following the grooves of what appeared to be the tracks of a large truck along the length of the beach.

"I think I pissed in the sea!" Kid moaned as Wally dragged him onto the sand.

"Oh, ya care about pissin' in da sea, but ya don't care about pissin' on other people?" Mars snapped at him.

"Bad things happen when you piss in the sea!" Kid argued.

"Bad things happen when ya piss near me…" Mars growled in a low voice, brandishing a fist at Kid.

"Hey you guys, what's that noise?" Wally asked, scratching at his head.

"It sounds like…" Terry began.

"A helicopter," Kevin finished, pointing at the sky above the centre of the island.

"Ve're saved!" Jaeger said cheerfully.

"What luck!" Dik Dik said.

"Hey, down here!" Kid yelled, waving his arms above his head.

The others all began calling out and waving their arms desperately; but Kevin remained still, his eyes fixed onto the helicopter as it hovered closer, the proportions of the aircraft making him a little suspicious of its presence.

"Hey, what gives?" Mars muttered, his arms slowly lowering to his sides.

"That ain't no ordinary helicopter!" Terry said, his arms dropping.

"It's a robot!" Kid cried. "And it's got a camera attached to it! Hey, we're on TV!"

The others sweatdropped as Kid began hopping from foot to foot, waving at the camera.

"What is going on here?" Kevin grumbled.

A few seconds later, something collided with the top of Kevin's mask with a loud clang, bouncing off his head and landing on Wally's foot.

"Hey!" Wally complained, hopping away from the fallen object.

Ignoring the dull pain in his head, Kevin crouched down towards the rock, turning it over to reveal that a folded note of paper had been tied to it. Looking up for the source of the object, Kevin eventually located a green sphere high in the sky, almost entirely obscured from their sight by the glare of the sun.

"What is it, Kevin?" Kid asked.

"A note," Kevin replied, pulling the paper from the rock and standing up again.

"Who is it from, Kevin?" Kid asked.

"Oh, it's from the IWF," Kevin replied as he opened out the folded page.

"What does it say, Kevin?" Kid asked.

Kevin turned his head to Kid, glaring at him silently.

"What does it say, Kevin?" Kid asked again.

"Somebody shut him up," Kevin grumbled.

"Shut-up, pig-boy!" Mars yelled at Kid, causing him to leap behind Wally and grin nervously.

"Okay, this is from the IWF, it's addressed to me," Kevin began slowly. "But I think you all ought to hear what it says."

The others all edged closer, listening with interest as Kevin began to read the note.

"Kevin Mask, welcome to the first series of _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_," he read. "_Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ is a new reality television series created by the IWF chairman, Jacqueline McMadd, and you and the Muscle League are the stars of the show. There are several cameras and various items of audio recording equipment stationed around the island to capture your day-to-day activities as you attempt to survive the conditions on this desert island. The results of your efforts will be broadcast live around the world, including 24-hour coverage on the IWF channel in Japan."

"What?" Mars snarled.

"It appears that our "mission in The Philippines" was just a ruse to get us here," Kevin concluded.

"We are on TV!" Kid chirped.

"We're being filmed fighting for food and survival on a desert island," Dik Dik said flatly.

"But that's no fun!" Kid protested.

"Exactly, Kid!" Terry sighed. "How long is this madness gonna last? I'm gettin' married on the 14th! I gotta be back in Texas in less than ten days, I don't got time for this!"

"It doesn't say anything about how long they intend to keep us here," Kevin replied.

"So that plane crash wasn't an accident?" Wally asked. "The pilot deliberately left us to land here alone?"

"What if…" Dik Dik began slowly. "What if they keep us here for longer than a week?"

"They better not!" Terry argued, waving a fist at the helicopter high above them. "Ya hear me, McMadd? I gotta get back to my fiancée!"

"Vot about food, fresh vater and shelter?" Jaeger asked.

"Never mind about dat!" Mars said. "What about entertainment, huh? I don't wanna spend da next week stuck here wid Kid Muscle and no electricity!"

"We could sing campfire songs!" Kid suggested. "C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!" he sang.

"Dat's exactly my point," Mars said darkly.

"Hey Kid, no music, no girls, no TV, no cow and rice and nobody to talk to but who ya see standin' around ya," Terry said firmly to Kid.

Kid slowly looked about himself, pouting thoughtfully.

"But that sucks!" he concluded.

"Exactly!" the others all chorused.

The group slowly lifted their heads, looking first at the helicopter, the lens of the camera it supported on its nose winking at them against the sunlight, and then at the green sphere hovering near it.

"How long is this going to last?" Kevin Mask muttered, talking more to himself than anyone else.

A few seconds later, he vaguely saw something falling from the sphere above them, another rock smacking into his face a moment later and sliding to the ground.

"Hey, another note!" Kid cried. "What does is say, Kevin?"

"Read it yourself!" Kevin snapped irritably.

"Okay," Kid said, squatting down and retrieving the note from the rock. "Let's see…"

Kid stood again, unfolding the paper.

"Kevin Mask, the series is scheduled to run for eight weeks," he announced.

Kid smiled at the others, their horrified expressions slowly alerting him to the exact implications of what he had just read.

"Eight weeks?!" he wailed. "No music, no girls, no TV, no cow and rice and nobody to talk to for eight weeks?"

"Eight weeks? That's absurd!" Dik Dik spat, snatching the note from Kid to read through it for himself.

"I can barely spare eight days, this can't be happenin'!" Terry shouted angrily.

"Eight weeks?" Kid cried, dropping to his knees and tilting his head back to look up at the camera in the sky. "Why Jacqueline, why? Who will take care of my beautiful wife and my five handsome children during the long, cold winter nights?"

"If I gotta stay on dis island for eight weeks wid dis asshole, I'ma kill him," Mars said flatly. "In fact, I might just kill all of yous, cause dey ain't got much of a show if dey only got one guy left!"

"That's not exactly a productive attitude, Mars!" Dik Dik sneered.

"Hey, dis ain't even a good time for me to be playin' stupid games!" Mars argued back.

"It ain't a good time for you?" Terry echoed. "What about me? I got a weddin' all planned and ready to go, this ain't exactly convenient for me, neither!"

"My wife and children can't manage without me!" Kid complained.

"You ain't got no children, Kid!" Terry pointed out.

"You don't know that!" Kid shot back.

Terry paused, his eyebrows slowly creeping upwards.

"He ain't got no kids," Mars intercepted. "He just likes to think dat he does."

"Tis most unusual," Checkmate mused. "Why wouldst the McMadds do this unto us now?"

The others all adopted pensive looks as they tried to figure out why they had been purposely dumped onto a desert island; but they were soon distracted from their thoughts as they all began to notice Jaeger's face turning steadily redder and his hands fidgeting at his sides.

"Something you want to tell us, Jaeger?" Dik Dik asked him.

"Uh…" he began. "Nein?"

"C'mon kid, what gives?" Mars asked him.

"Vell…"

Jaeger began tapping the tips of his index fingers together, lowering his head in an attempt to hide his awkwardness.

"Tell us now, or I will beat it out of you!" Kevin warned him.

"I may have upset Jack," Jaeger immediately replied, grinning nervously at Kevin.

"Oh yeah?" Mars asked. "What did ya do?"

"I uh…" Jaeger began nervously. "I sort of… Vell…"

"Dude, I thought you said that you dumped Jacqueline like last week?" Kid said.

The others all turned to Kid for a moment before turning back to Jaeger, glaring at him accusingly.

"She vasn't very happy…" Jaeger said quietly. "But it seemed like ze right zhing to do…"

"Ah, nuts!" Mars cursed, kicking hard at the sand. "We're bein' held here by some jilted broad!"

"If that's really what this is all about, I'm sure she won't keep us here for long," Wally tried. "She'll soon see reason and let us go."

"This is Jacqueline McMadd we're talkin' about here, Wally!" Terry yelled at him. "Ya think she can't hold a grudge or make us suffer for long? Have you forgotten already what she done did to Kid, Mars and Kevin durin' the Chojin Crown?"

"Kevin, you gotta do something!" Kid insisted. "You're the leader, get us out of here!"

Kevin scowled at Kid, a look almost wasted behind his mask, which showed nothing more than a thinning of his eyes.

"Luckily for you, I have actually thought of something that should end this madness," Kevin coldly answered him. "I got the idea when Terry mentioned the Chojin Crown. Mars, do you remember what you did during that "Love, Honour and Redemption" chat show we were forced to attend?"

Kevin turned to Mars, who looked thoughtful for a moment before slowly nodding his head.

"I said a lotta nasty stuff I knew would get da show taken off air, cause it was live, daytime viewin'," he said.

"Exactly," Kevin said. "This is daytime and we are on live television. All we have to do is be as vulgar, rude and obscene as possible, and this show will be axed."

"Hell yeah!" Terry agreed, punching a fist into the air.

"Not strong enough," Kevin corrected him.

"Fuck yeah!" Kid said cheerfully, punching a fist into the air.

"Better," Kevin said to him.

"This is fun!" Kid squealed, leaping to his feet. "I'm not allowed to say fuck at home! Fuck fuckety-fuck!"

"I gotta better idea!" Terry said.

He turned to Kevin, who tilted his head slightly.

"Uh…" Terry said slowly. "I mean shit, I got me a fuckin' excellent idea. Let's write obscene messages in big letters in the sand so that the cameras can't film us without showin' bad language!"

"I like it!" Kevin said.

"I'll help!" Jaeger offered.

Terry and Jaeger started off to commence their mission, skidding to a halt as Kid let out a particularly long and sickening fart.

"More of that, too!" Kevin told him.

"Aw dude, that was just an accident," Kid said meekly.

"Do it again, and do it louder!" Kevin told him.

"Really?" Kid responded.

"Absolutely!"

"I love this fucking game!"

Kid clenched his fists and squatted down, pushing out a cloud of green smoke that made the others back away from him a little.

"Uh-oh…" he muttered, opening one eye and looking around the others. "I think I just pooped a little."

"That's good, talk like that will get this show banned for sure!" Kevin said.

"Dude, I'm not joking here," Kid said, pulling back his pants and looking over his shoulder.

"Uh…" Kevin gulped, backing away from Kid.

"Hey, I've got a better idea!" Kid concluded, releasing the waistband of his pants with a snap of elastic. "Let's all get naked!"

"Or not!" Mars immediately disagreed.

"Yeah!" Kid cried, tearing off his clothing.

"Stop that!" Kevin snapped at him. "Nobody wants to see your– oh dear…"

Kid screamed out, throwing his arms into the air and charging along the length of the beach; completely naked.

"I'm blamin' you for this, Kevin Mask!" Terry said, pointing at Kevin.

"Why me?" Kevin snapped.

"You told Kid we had to be as vulgar, rude and obscene as possible," Wally gently explained. "But since Kid is always vulgar, rude and obscene, he's now taking it to another level."

"You suck Kevin!" Jaeger said.

"Hey, we're only here because of you!" Kevin argued back.

"Heads up, he's comin' back," Terry muttered.

The others turned to see Kid running through the surf, his arms still up in the air above his head, his eyes and mouth wide open.

"Hey, come on you guys!" he called to them as he neared them once more. "Get naked!"

"I am not comfortable with this," Checkmate said.

"Me neither," Terry agreed.

"I guess it wouldn't be so bad, I mean, we do all shower together," Wally reasoned.

"But people all over ze vorld vould see your private parts!" Jaeger argued. "Even your own family!"

"Sheesh, there's an awful thought!" Terry agreed. "I can't imagine anythin' more embarrassin' than my ma and pa and Trixie's ma and pa seein' me in the nude!"

"Kid Muscle doesn't have that problem," Dik Dik said flatly. "His family are all idiots who love nothing more than to eat, fart and humiliate themselves and others."

"C'mon Mars, get your ass out again!" Kid shrieked, grabbing Mars's trouser legs and tugging downwards forcefully.

"Hey!" Mars protested, grabbing desperately at the waistband of his trousers, barely concealing his crotch as Kid succeeded in pulling the back of his trousers down to his knees.

"Mars has got a fantastic ass!" Kid told the others. "It's really, really smooth!"

Twenty minutes later, seven bruised and bloodied Chojins sat sulking around a small, fading campfire.

"This is shameful," Kevin Mask declared.

"Hey, I'm hungry over here, it was a damn good idea!" Mars shot back.

"If it looks like a hog, it squeals like a hog and it smells like a hog, then sure as hell it oughta taste like a hog!" Terry added.

"We couldn't seriously have eaten Kid Muscle!" Wally pointed out.

"I'm a vegetarian, this whole discussion offends me," Dik Dik said haughtily.

"You vere ze von who lit ze fire!" Jaeger argued.

"Perhaps we should untie Kid now?" Checkmate suggested.

"Let da bastard hang!" Mars snarled.

All seven Chojins turned their heads to look back at Kid Muscle, who was bound and gagged by an intricate network of leaves and vines, his entire body suspended from a tree branch several feet off the ground. He moaned out a muffled complaint, but the others turned away from him again.

"I'm pretty sure we haven't even been here for a full half hour yet," Kevin began. "And in that time, we have resorted to homosexuality, cannibalism and a pointless, seven-way brawl. It's like we've all gone mad. We'll never last eight weeks like this."

"Sounds like somebody didn't get his ass kicked hard enough the first time around!" Terry challenged.

"Hey, everybody shut-up!" Mars snapped. "It ain't my fault I got such a beautiful ass! I didn't ask for dis heavenly body, I just gots to–"

"Oh please!" Dik Dik groaned. "We are all so sick and tired that old "heavenly body" routine! And don't try to tell us that Kid was the one coming on to you, Sailor Mars!"

"You son of a bitch!" Mars yelled, grabbing up a handful of sand and throwing it at Dik Dik.

A gust of wind appeared from nowhere, sending most of the sand into Jaeger's face and depositing the rest onto the embers of the fire, destroying it entirely.

"Hey!" Jaeger protested.

"Sorry kid," Mars apologised.

"Shouldn't we be apologising to Kid Muscle?" Wally asked. "We did try to roast him over a fire, after all."

"You vere ze von who asked for von of his legs!" Jaeger reminded him.

"This is ridiculous!" Kevin snapped, standing abruptly. "All this petty bickering is beneath a Chojin! Take a lesson from us Brits, and try to keep a stiff upper lip!"

"Pff, yeah, you had more'n a stiff upper lip when you was lookin' at my ass," Mars muttered.

"Shut the fuck up, Mars!" Kevin yelled at him.

"You shut the fuck up!" Mars yelled, jumping up and shoving him.

"Break it up, assholes!" Terry yelled, jumping between them.

"Ja, don't start zhat again!" Jaeger agreed, joining Terry.

Kevin and Mars looked at other silently for a moment before both nodding their heads and grabbing a man each, slamming Terry and Jaeger together.

"Hey you guys!" Wally cried.

"Act your age, you miserable cretins!" Dik Dik said, standing up.

Mars and Kevin started towards them, but both were pounced on by Jaeger and Terry. Checkmate tried to intervene between the four, but he shortly found himself being squashed as Wally and Dik Dik leapt into the fray. After a few sharp shoves and badly thrown punches, the group once more erupted into another all-out brawl, apparently oblivious to the cameras still watching their every move.

* * *

"Welcome back fight fans to _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_! I am your host, Mac Metaphor!"

"And I am your host, Doc Nakano. If you missed the first part of today's show, don't forget to check the highlights special at 10pm tonight, where we will show you the complete and uncut altercation between the members of the Muscle League."

"And it looks like another altercation is breaking out as we speak Doc! I wonder what they could be fighting about this time?"

Roxanne sighed, slapping a hand against her forehead.

"Oh come on now Roxanne!" Marie said gently, giving her a reassuring hug. "I'm sure it wasn't as bad as it looked!"

"Good job they censored it…" Meat muttered. "If those guys don't kill the kid, I might just kill him myself when he gets back here!"

"Oh this is just awful!" Kiki moaned. "How can they do this? What about poor Trixie and Terry?"

Roxanne, Marie, Meat and Kiki all turned to the bathroom door. It was still firmly shut, but they could faintly hear Trixie snivelling beyond it.

"I can't believe that bitch Jack!" Roxanne roared, standing abruptly.

"Roxanne, that's unkind!" Marie scolded her.

"Unkind? Crashing my husband onto a desert island where he's been beat up, tied up and almost eaten alive is unkind!" Roxanne argued back.

"Well, y'know, he did kinda ask for it…" Kiki muttered.

"What?" Roxanne yelped, rounding on Kiki.

Kiki shrugged, smiling innocently up at her.

"Kid did try to expose Mars on live television," she pointed out.

"So what?" Roxanne growled. "It's not like we all haven't seen Mars naked before!"

"What?" Kiki yelped, leaping to her feet to confront Roxanne.

"Oh come on, Kiki!" Roxanne groaned, rolling her eyes. "He printed his family jewels all over a stack of money!"

"Hey!" Kiki wailed, her face turning red. "You know I'm still upset about that and what it did to my dad, it's not fair to bring that up now!"

"Oh, but it is fair that your boyfriend tried to eat my husband?"

"Well he does look like a big fat pig!"

"Oh yeah? Well maybe they ought to eat your boyfriend instead, since he's nothing but a giant turkey!"

Kiki gasped, clapping a hand over her mouth in horror.

"Both of you shut up!" Trixie yelled, yanking open the bathroom door and glowering at them with make-up smeared eyes. "I'm the one losing out on my own wedding here! Either feel sorry for me, or shut-up!"

"She's right," Roxanne sighed. "We have to do something about this, it's ridiculous."

"Well why don't you girls just all vote for Terry?" Marie suggested. "Jacqueline said that the wrestler with the most votes will leave the show first. If you all vote for Terry, he will be back in time for his wedding."

"But what about all the others?" Kiki asked. "It's not much of a wedding with no best man and no guests!"

"If I'm voting at all, I'm voting for Mantaro," Roxanne ground out. "If he stays on that island with those assholes, they'll kill him!"

"I've got a better idea," Trixie said darkly. "Let's just all go down the IWF headquarters and deal with this problem at its source: Jacqueline McMadd!"

* * *

Jacqueline hummed happily to herself as she checked her reflection, fluffing her hair with one hand and adjusting the neckline of her vest with the other.

"Miss McMadd, there's someone here to see you," a voice called into her dressing room.

"I'm busy," she replied dismissively, before pouting at the mirror and grabbing up a lipstick.

"She says it urgent."

"I'm still busy."

Jacqueline smiled as the door closed again and she was once more left alone. However, her peace was short-lived, as the door swung violently open a second later, and the stiff outline of a lone female figure appeared in her mirror. Jacqueline frowned at the reflection for a moment before turning on her stool and tilting her head curiously at the barely discernible silhouette in the doorway.

"Can I help you?" she asked.

"Yes," a voice replied. "You can send a helicopter to whatever remote island you dumped the Muscle League onto and fly them back here right now."

"I can't do that," Jacqueline replied, smiling sarcastically. "But I can call security and have you removed from here."

"You have messed with my life for the last time, you obnoxious, vain, thoughtless bitch!"

Jacqueline yelped, leaping from her stool and barely escaping harm as the woman pounced at her, colliding with her vanity desk. She spun around, her eyes widening as an irate scar-faced woman began stalking towards her, rolling up her sleeves as she approached.

"You look familiar…" Jacqueline mused.

"I'm your worst nightmare!"

Jacqueline hurriedly kicked a chair at her attacker and fled from the room, aiming herself for the nearest security guard.

"You made a huge mistake putting her in charge!" Ikeman said moodily, scowling at his father.

"It may look that way, but…" Vance began, rubbing his chin as he eyed the monitor in front of them. "According to this, viewing figures are through the roof."

"What?!" Ikeman cried.

"Face it, your sister has just struck gold."

Ikeman turned to Jacqueline, who was pointing back at Amy, setting two security guards on her.

"The Muscle League hate being on her show," he concluded. "And when they get back, they will demand that I am restored as rightful chairman!"

* * *

**Next Chapter: **The Muscle League are set their first task on the show, but their bickering and constantly decreasing sanity threatens to ruin their chances of surviving each other, far less completing the task at hand.** Chapter 3 – Reality Bites**


	3. Reality Bites

**A/N:** White Day is March 14th, and it is the men's version of Valentine's Day in Japan.

Movie references galore. If any really don't make any sense, check them out on IMDB.

**Recap:** Dumped on a desert island, the Muscle League quickly disintegrated as frustration overtook common sense.

* * *

**Chapter 3 – Reality Bites**

Jaeger licked his lips nervously, his eyes darting back and forth between the charred object on the end of the stick and Mars's face as he viewed his prey.

"Vot is it?" he asked.

"I dunno," Mars confessed. "I kinda looked like a some bastard rat-racoon."

"Vot if it's poisonous?" Jaeger asked.

"I gotta strong stomach," Mars confidently replied. "I can handle it."

Mars started to lift the end of the stick towards his mouth, pausing as Dik Dik let out a noise of disapproval.

"What now, Bambi?" he asked, shifting his amber eyes to the gazelle, who was watching him warily.

"Are you going to eat the skin too?" he asked.

"And the fur?" Wally asked from across the fire.

"I'm thinkin' about it," Mars confirmed with a nod of his head.

The others watched on with wide eyes as Mars moved the roasted carcass a little closer to his face, sniffing experimentally at it.

"Where did you find it?" Terry asked.

"It was eatin' some eggs in a nest back in da woods," Mars replied.

"Well I'm not eating any of it, it smells like old lady feet!" Kid said sulkily, folding his arms across his chest.

"Who said I was sharin'?" Mars growled at him. "Dis is _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_, remember? And everybody knows its survival of da fittest. Eat or be eaten…"

Kid cowered back from Mars, inadvertently bumping into Checkmate.

"Hey, aren't you guys hungry too?" he asked, turning to Checkmate and Kevin Mask, who were sat watching the waves dancing in the moonlight. "We've been here for like forty hours already, I'm totally starving!"

"Tis a mere case of mind over matter," Checkmate replied.

"Self-control," Kevin added. "We just have to get through tonight, and hopefully by tomorrow the ratings for this show will be so terrible, we will be allowed to return home."

"Or perhaps a motley crew of devious miscreants will arise," Checkmate suggested.

"Well, there's nothing like a disaster to restore normality," Kevin agreed.

"You guys are just weird!" Kid moaned, turning back to the other five Chojins, who were all still staring intently at Mars and his potential meal. "And you guys are total freaks! I wanna go home! I'm so hungry and so tired and so bored!"

"Don't start whining, it's bad enough being stuck here like a prisoner," Dik Dik scolded him.

"Yeah Kid, we're all hungry, tired, bored and horny as all hell, but we just gotta get through this, yeah?" Terry said.

The others all slowly turned towards him, eying him sceptically.

"What?" he echoed, looking around them innocently.

"Dude, I never said that I was horny," Kid pointed out.

"Dang Kid, get your mind outta the gutter!" Terry snapped at him. "All you ever think about is food and skirts!"

"I wasn't the one who said horny, you were!" Kid argued.

Terry paused, his face slowly turning red.

"Really?" he muttered.

"Yes!" Kid replied.

Terry gulped audibly, glancing around the others. He let out a small, awkward laugh before turning to Mars.

"Say Mars, how's that weasel taste?" he asked, hoping to divert attention away from his blunder.

"Hey uh…" Mars began, looking down at the sizzling furry creature in thought. "Eight weeks is a long time for a guy to uh… Y'know…"

"To be without female company," Dik Dik finished for him.

"I ain't gone eight weeks without a woman since…" Mars began, rolling his eyes up to the sky in thought.

"Eight weeks here means my weddin'll be cancelled for sure," Terry sighed. "And that means I gotta wait even longer for my weddin' night."

The others laughed a little, muttering out various comments on the matter.

"This isn't fair, I've got a totally hot wife at home, why do I have to be stuck here with you ugly bastards?" Kid moaned.

"Hey, you was droolin' over my ass less than five hours ago!" Mars snapped at him.

"Yeah but only because it reminds me of Roxanne!"

The group all fell silent, glaring at Kid with looks of worried curiosity.

"I just wanna go home!" he sobbed.

"Trixie'll kill me if I miss our weddin'," Terry said with a sigh.

"Yeah, well, at least it's all good for you and your girl," Mars grumbled. "Kiki had me sleepin' in da garden shed, and she wouldn't even hold my hand after da ass incident. I'm already sufferin' here, another eight weeks like dis and I might have to kill somebody."

"My wife will kill me if I have to stay here for eight weeks," Dik Dik announced. "We were… Well, we've been trying for a baby, and it hasn't been going very well so far."

"What do you call a baby dik-dik?" Kid asked.

"Kid, this isn't a joke," Dik Dik replied.

"No dude, I'm serious!" Kid insisted. "If your wife has a baby, is it a baby, or is it a kitten?"

"Maybe it's a pup, like Vally's sister," Jaeger suggested.

"Are you calling my sister a dog?" Wally yelped.

"She is a sea-dog," Terry pointed out.

Kid covered his mouth with one hand, muffling his giggles.

"Your sister is a dog!" he laughed out.

"Well at least her children won't be piglets!" Wally shot back.

"Hey!" Kid cried. "The pig insults hurt the most!"

"Insults?" Mars grunted. "Look in a mirror asshole, we ain't insultin' ya, we're tellin' it like it is."

"Oh yeah?" Kid sneered. "Well your babies will be eggs!"

"I ain't havin' no babies," Mars said confidently. "And even if I did, dey would kick your piglets' asses!"

"Why are we doin' this, you guys?" Terry asked, looking around the others. "It ain't helpin' none! All this talk is just remindin' us what we're missin' out on being stuck here like this!"

"Yeah, I really miss my mother," Wally sighed.

The others all turned to him sharply, but he appeared not to notice anything wrong with his last statement.

"Your mom has got the biggest boobs I have ever seen," Kid suddenly said.

The others turned to Kid, their faces twisting in alarm.

"Ha, she's also got the biggest ass I've ever seen!" Kid snorted.

Twenty minutes later, Kevin Mask, Mars, Jaeger, Checkmate, Dik Dik Van Dik and Terry Kenyon all watched in silent bemusement as Wally Tusket attempted to drown Kid Muscle in the ocean.

"This cannot continue," Kevin Mask mused. "We are literally in danger of killing each other if we have to live like this. It really will be a show about survival, because if we can't even last one day without television, food, a proper bed or women, how will we last eight weeks?"

"I say Kid will start to choke and Wally will feel guilty and back off," Dik Dik proposed.

"I agree," Terry said. "Wally always was a soft touch."

"I disagree," Jaeger replied. "Vally loves his family, he vill fight to defend zheir honour."

"I agree wid Jaeger," Mars added.

"You wanna put your money where your mouth is?" Terry asked him.

"Sure," Mars said dryly. "I bet you two palm leaves and da sand outta da crack o' my ass dat Wally doesn't let up."

"I'll raise you a vine and a handful of these potentially poisonous berries I found," Dik Dik replied.

"I see your vine and berries, and I raise ya a slightly burnt weasel head and some seaweed," Mars answered.

"Interesting, interesting…" Dik Dik said thoughtfully, rubbing his chin.

"We raise ya babysittin' duties!" Terry cut in. "If we win, you guys gotta deal with Kid Muscle tonight when he starts havin' nightmares and cryin' for his wife!"

"Brutal!" Mars laughed. "I raise ya–"

"Shut-up!" Kevin snapped, standing abruptly. "All of you! This isn't helping!"

"Aw c'mon now, Kev!" Terry said. "We was just havin' some fun! We gotta do somethin' to get through this!"

"No, we don't have to get through this, we have to get out of this!" Kevin argued back. "McMadd!" he yelled, waving a fist up at the dark night sky. "How long do you intend to leave us here without food or shelter?"

"Check it out dude, Kevin's gone crazy already!" Kid said to Wally as Wally tried to strangle him in the waves.

Wally stopped his attack and turned to Kevin, watching as a large rock fell from the sky, clunking loudly against Kevin's mask before falling to the ground with a dull thud.

"Hey Kevin!" Kid called. "What is it, Kevin? What does it say, Kevin? Who is it from, Kevin? Where did it–"

"Shut-up or I'll pull a Big Ben Edge on you!" Kevin cut him off.

Mars crawled across the sand to retrieve the rock, removing the attached note and sitting back to read it.

"Kevin Mask," he read aloud. "Your first challenge will begin at dawn tomorrow. You will have until sundown to build a model of da Empire State Building outta ramen, which will be supplied to you at sunrise. You have a budget of seven days basic food supply at your disposal. You may gamble as much of dis budget as you want, and if you are successful in your task, we will double your gamble as a reward. If ya fail, ya lose da amount ya gambled."

Mars lifted his head, looking around the others, drawing a little relief from the looks of concern they all wore.

"We're getting ramen for breakfast?" Kid called back to them.

"No, ya idiot!" Terry yelled back. "We gotta build a model of the Empire State Buildin' outta… Hey, wait a darn cotton-pickin' minute, what the hell? We gotta build a model of the Empire State Buildin' outta ramen? Cooked ramen? How the heck is that even possible?"

"Do we get food before we start dis shit?" Mars asked anyone who cared to listen. "Cause I already wanna eat my own foot, if dey make me handle warm, fresh ramen all day and I ain't allowed to eat nothin' I can't guarantee I won't kill somebody."

"The Empire State Buildin'?" Terry repeated. "Outta wet, sticky ramen? On this here sand?"

"And what does it mean about gambling our food budget?" Dik Dik asked. "I don't like the sound of that. If we only receive seven days basic food supply and we don't get another chance to receive food for the next week, we can't afford to gamble any of it!"

"But if we gambled all of it, it says here dey gotta double what we wager," Mars pointed out. "We could get ourselves fourteen days worth o' food outta dis!"

"This is ludicrous, they can't do this to us!" Kevin argued.

"Well unless you can think of a way outta this, we gotta do what the flying rocks tell us to do!" Terry shouted back at him.

"He's right Kev," Mars agreed. "We can do dis. And if all else fails, we'll just go back to plan A."

"Remind me what plan A was?" Kevin asked.

"We eat porky," Mars replied, pointing out to sea where Kid was still being held by Wally.

"Wonderful…" Kevin grumbled moodily.

* * *

"Goodnight, Miss McMadd!"

Jacqueline nodded her head, walking towards the door out of the studio. The first day of _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ had proved to be a big success, and she was confident that the next would be just as popular, if not perhaps more so, when the contestants began their first trial. A sudden ragged, animalistic cry made Jacqueline stumble to a halt, her eyes widening in alarm. She ducked and a gust of air shot over her head. Looking up, she saw a thoroughly enraged girl glaring at her, her teeth bared angrily, a baseball bat gripped in her hands.

"Trixie," she said, straightening up again. "Are you enjoying my new show?"

"You evil, wicked witch!" Trixie growled. "I invited you to my wedding, I thought we were friends! How could you do this to me? You knew I was getting married on White Day, why did you send my fiancé away to some stupid desert island?"

"I had to prove to my father that I'm a better chairman that Ikeman," Jacqueline replied with a shrug of indifference. "You can reschedule your wedding, I can't reschedule my life."

"Reschedule my…"

Trixie paused, before a look of pure hatred filled her face and she violently swung the baseball bat at Jacqueline's head again.

"Security!" Jacqueline yelled out.

"You won't get away with this!" Trixie snarled, taking another shot at Jacqueline's head, and again barely missing her target.

Jacqueline sighed in relief as two burly men grabbed Trixie up and carried her off, kicking and screaming all the way.

"Who knew being successful would be so complicated?" she sighed, fluffing her hair.

* * *

Trixie screamed as she was dropped to the floor, the door slammed shut on her.

"Damn it!" she shouted out, pushing herself to her feet and running up to the door. "You can't keep me in here, it's illegal!" she yelled, thumping her fists against the door in protest. "Let me out right now, you hear?"

"It's no use, they don't even care," a voice advised her.

Turning around sharply, Trixie saw a dark-haired woman slumped on a bench in the back corner of the room, looking even more miserable than Trixie herself felt right then.

"Hey, don't I know you?" Trixie asked, crossing to room towards her. "It's Amy, right?"

"Yeah, hi," Amy replied, lifting her head to look up at Trixie. "Trixie, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Trixie said, sitting down next to her. "So how did you end up in here?"

"I took Kevin to the airport to fly out to The Philippines, and I just…" Amy began, shaking her head. "I couldn't let him go alone, but I knew that he wouldn't want me interfering, so I got myself a flight to Tokyo. I was hoping that I could visit Marie Nikaidou and ask her if she knew what was going on, since she lives with Meat. But when I arrived here, I saw Kevin and the others on the island, and I just saw red… I came straight here to demand that Jacqueline let them go, and she had security take me to this room. I've been here for hours on my own, and I've tried to complain, but the furthest I got was Ikeman bringing me a glass of water and telling me not to upset his sister because she's gone mad and she's dangerous."

"Great," Trixie sighed. "I came here because if this show doesn't end soon, I'll have to cancel my wedding, and I really, really can't do that!"

Amy turned to Trixie with a frown, which Trixie returned with an anxious look of her own.

"Oh," Amy said, nodding her head. "I see… That really does suck. I was just about to tell Kevin something myself before the letter from the IWF arrived, and I never got the chance. If he really is gone for the whole eight weeks, it's going to be too late to explain it to him by then."

"I guess it was stupid to come down here "with my guns blazin'", as Terry would say," Trixie sighed. "But I always get really angry and forget to think straight in a crisis. Roxanne and Kiki are more sensible than me, hopefully they'll think of something to help us out."

Amy nodded her head.

"I hope so," she said. "Otherwise we're screwed."

* * *

Kevin Mask groaned, lifting his head and coughing up a mouthful of sand; which was something of a wonder, as he had apparently slept in his mask. Blinking back the vestiges of sleep, he looked about himself, finding four of his fellow Muscle Leaguers splayed against the sand still asleep. Looking out to sea he found Jaeger and Wally Tusket wading through the water attempting to catch fish. Turning to the trees, Kevin found Dik Dik Van Dik arranging a variety of fruits and mushrooms he had evidently salvaged from within the wilds of the trees behind them. He looked a little pale, and Kevin suspected that this meant that most of the gazelle's findings had been inedible.

Sitting up with a small groan, Kevin saw that the sun was quite clearly risen, and yet there was no sign of the promised ramen for the day's task.

"Hey," Dik Dik called to him as he stood up and dusted the sand from his clothing.

"Hello," Kevin called back. "Where is the ramen then?"

Dik Dik pulled an unusual face at Kevin, who tilted his head questioningly in reply; but he did not have to wonder about Dik Dik's meaning for long, as something smacked off the top of his mask. Growling angrily, Kevin bent down to retrieve the latest rock, pulling from it a short note.

"Kevin Mask, your task for this week is to build a model of the Empire State Building out of ramen, which will shortly be supplied to you. You have until sundown to complete the task. If you do not successfully create an accurate depiction of the Empire State Building by this time, you will lose the amount of your gamble. Please now select the percentage of next week's food budget that you wish to gamble."

Kevin turned to the others, finding that everyone apart from Kid Muscle was awake and all were visibly pondering the contents of the note.

"I say we gamble da whole damn lot!" Mars insisted, rising to his feet.

"And if we lose?" Dik Dik asked him.

"We'll make do wid what we find around da island until next week!" Mars replied.

"I've been searching this island since first light this morning," Dik Dik said, standing up. "So far, I've found three different types of poisonous berries, two types of inedible fungi and one strain of hallucinogenic fungus, seven coconuts and some strange plants that look like they might produce pineapples. If you think we can live off of one coconut and a handful of magic mushrooms shared between the eight of us every day for the next seven days, then go ahead and gamble it!"

"Hey, while you've been wastin' time in da jungle, my boy Jaeger and tusks have been catchin' us some real food!" Mars shot back.

"Vell, not really…" Jaeger said meekly as he waded ashore, holding up a vine, suspended from which was half of a medium sized crab and two small, dark-coloured fish.

"I don't think those fish will be edible," Wally added. "They kinda look like they might be poisonous."

"There you go!" Dik Dik called over. "I say we gamble the absolute minimum amount. That way, even if we lose, we can ration ourselves and still survive."

"I don't know da meanin' of da word "ration", and I ain't a coward!" Mars yelled. "Kev, gamble da whole lot!"

"Kevin, gamble the minimum!" Dik Dik yelled.

"I agree vith Mars," Jaeger offered. "Ze IWF von't let us starve out here, ve might as vell gamble it all."

"I don't know you guys, it's a big risk," Wally said. "I agree with Dik Dik, I think we should gamble the minimum."

"Okay, two of you say the whole lot and two say the minimum," Kevin said, before turning to Checkmate and Terry. "What about you two?"

"I agree with Jaeger," Terry said. "They can't let us die o' starvation out here, I reckon we got nothin' to lose, and I reckon we can do this dumb task. Gamble the whole dang lot!"

"I disagree," Checkmate said. "Without basic daily sustenance, we could fall foul of illness. Resources here are clearly lacking, tis too dangerous to gamble our supplies."

Kevin sighed.

"Three say gamble it all, three say don't," he concluded. "Kid Muscle is still asleep, and frankly he is a stupid fat bastard, so I don't particularly care to hear his opinion on this matter. I personally couldn't care any less: I can manage perfectly well without food, so it makes no difference to me either way, therefore the only logical thing to do is to meet halfway: let's gamble half the food on this task. If we lose, we have to ration ourselves to half portions of food for a week. If we win, we get one and a half times our required amount of food, and perhaps we can devise a way of storing some of that in case this madness is to become a weekly game. Any objections?"

"Naw, you're right Kev," Terry agreed. "Some of the debris from the plane wreck washed ashore overnight, I saw a few hollow metal parts we could fill with water and hide in the shade of the trees to store food in, like a sorta fridge."

"Good idea, I like it," Kevin commended him.

"We can sun-dry fruit and vegetables," Dik Dik pointed out. "And pickle them, that way they will last for weeks."

"Excellent," Kevin agreed.

"Ve could use ze hollow metal to gather rainwater," Jaeger added. "And if ve use it to dilute milk from ze coconuts, ve can make a source of sugars in case ve run out food and need energy."

"Nice thinking!" Kevin said. "Ha! You hear that McMadd? We're smarter than you thought!"

"We can dry seaweed and use it to bulk out our food supplies," Wally suggested. "And it's a good source of salt, which we'll need in this heat, in case we dehydrate."

"Very good," Kevin said.

"I just had a dream that Roxanne was totally making out with Hitomi Shimatani," Kid announced, sitting up suddenly. "Usually that would make me kinda horny, but I sorta think Hitomi looks like a pig, so I don't know if I find that hot or not. What do you guys think?"

"I think Kid shouldn't be in charge of today's task," Terry said darkly.

"I'm in charge," Kevin quickly reminded him. "Kid, shut-up. McMadd, we want to gamble half of the food on this task."

Kevin looked up at the green ball floating about them, squinting against the sun to focus on it, as it appeared to grow larger. As the ball slowly descended, the others backed up warily, until they saw that the ball was in fact a small aircraft, piloted by Mac Metaphor and Doc Nakano.

"Hey you guys!" Terry said cheerfully, jogging over to them as they landed.

"It's Terry Kenyon, fight fans!" Mac announced into his headset.

"You guys are commentatin' on this here show?" Terry asked, staggering to a halt before he reached them.

"Kevin Mask has just agreed to gamble fifty percent of the food budget on today's task Mac: a wise move?" Doc asked.

"Time will tell, Doc, time will tell. And now fans, today's exciting challenge is about to begin: can the Muscle League create an accurate model of the Empire State Building out of ramen?"

The window along the front of the green ball buzzed open and Doc dropped two large boxes out onto the sand. The Muscle League began to approach the boxes, but were all promptly blinded by a storm of sand as the ball carrying the two colour commentators took off at speed, shooting back up into the sky.

"Damnit!" Mars growled.

"Oh bollocks," Kevin groaned.

As the only member of the group with full head protection, Kevin had been the first to recover his eyesight.

"They've given us two boxes and a pan. You know what this means, don't you?"

Kevin looked around the others expectantly as they rubbed at their watering eyes.

"We gotta cook it first?" Terry asked.

"Hey, dere's a note," Mars said, reaching for the piece of paper taped to the side of one of the boxes.

"What does it say, Mars?" Kid asked. "Who is it from, Mars? Why is it–"

"Alright, shut-up!" Mars snapped at him. "It says here we gotta cook da ramen, den use it to build da model. It also says dey ain't givin' us a picture for reference, but we gotta build it real accurate."

"No problem," Terry said confidently. "I know exactly what the Empire State Building looks like."

"I think we all know roughly what it looks like, right guys?" Wally said with a smile. "It was in a pretty famous old film, after all!"

"Yeah, that's right!" Kid shouted out cheerfully. "_Sleepless in Seattle_!"

The others all turned to him with varying looks of condescending contempt, but Kid appeared not to notice.

"Man, that was an awesome film!" he continued. "Especially that bit when Will Smith was all like "bew-bew" with the big gun!"

Kid began acting out shooting random members of the group.

"Kid, what'n the heck are ya talkin' about now?" Terry yelled at him.

"I thought _Sleepless in Seattle_ was some damn chick movie?" Mars muttered.

"It was," Dik Dik groaned. "We were talking about _King Kong_, Kid. When King Kong climbs the Empire State Building? And Will Smith was never in _Sleepless in Seattle_. You're thinking of _Independence Day_… Although frankly you ought to be embarrassed to claim knowledge of either of those films. I know I certainly am."

"Wait, what?" Kid echoed. "I thought that film with all those crazy mutants that came out at night to try to eat Will Smith was _Sleepless in Seattle_?"

"What?" Dik Dik grunted.

"Now you're talkin' about _I Am Legend_, Kid," Terry said.

"Shut-up, all of you!" Kevin snapped irritably. "Just start building a fire and get some water in this pan. The sooner we cook the ramen, the sooner can start this task and get it over and done with."

The others all grumbled out complaints to themselves, but began salvaging driftwood and adding it to the remains of the previous day's fire, as Dik Dik began attempting to light it once more.

"Are you sure Will Smith wasn't in _Sleepless in Seattle_?" Kid asked Dik Dik.

"Absolutely sure," Dik Dik replied. "Tom Hanks was the lead actor in that film."

"Tom Hanks? Like in _Castaway_?"

"Kid, don't even mention the name o' that film at a time like this!" Terry yelled at him Kid.

Kid paused, the mischievous look that began to appear on his face making Kevin suddenly feel a little nauseous.

"Just get on with making that fire!" Kevin warned him.

"Hey, do you guys remember _Castaway_?" Kid asked the others.

"Not really Kid, I was still in elementary school when that film came out," Terry flatly replied.

Kevin sighed, starting towards Dik Dik to assist him in his attempt to light the fire; but before he reached his goal something collided with his head, and a second later he could feel the sun on his face. Turning his head sharply he saw Kid Muscle cradling his mask in his hands.

"Hey you guys, check this out!" Kid squealed, jamming a handful of dry grass fronds into the eye-hole of Kevin's mask. "Wilson! Wilson!"

Twenty minutes later, Dik Dik was cooking a pot of ramen over the fire, Jaeger was opening the countless packets of instant ramen ready for cooking, Terry, Wally and Checkmate were starting work on the model Empire State Building, and Kevin was sitting by the edge of the trees, guarding Kid and Mars, both of whom were tied to a tree.

"I still don't get why ya had to tie me up too!" Mars complained.

"I don't trust you not to eat any of that stuff," Kevin reminded him.

"I know why he tied me up," Kid grumbled. "It's because I tell funnier jokes than he does and Kevin is a sore loser."

Kevin turned to glower at Kid, who grinned nervously.

"Well at least we survived one day on this island," Kevin said with a sigh as he turned back to monitor the others' progress in the task at hand. "One day down, only another fifty-five to go…"

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The day passes, and work on the task proves more demanding than anyone could have predicted, and the sanity of our heroes is once more called into question when things go a little awry. **Chapter 4 – True Colours**.


	4. True Colours

**Recap:** As if being stuck on a desert island for eight weeks wasn't bad enough, the Muscle League learned that their food supply was dependent on their successful completion of a ludicrous task.

* * *

**Chapter 4 – True Colours**

"Heh, heh, heh!"

Kevin sighed, thinning his eyes at Mars, who grinned back at him in delight.

"I'm going to release you," Kevin said reluctantly. "But know that if you eat so much as one noodle, I will kill you."

"Heh, I knew you was gonna say dat!" Mars sneered.

"Just don't make me regret this," Kevin warned him.

As Kevin untied Mars, Checkmate finally finished cooking the last of the ramen; a task he had been forced to take over after Dik Dik had collapsed from heat exhaustion. The sun had already past the mid-point in the sky, and during its peak, it had proved too much for Dik Dik who was working over a fire and pot of boiling water, and Wally, whose thick fur had made the heat unbearable. With two men out of commission, Checkmate had to take over the cooking, leaving only Terry and Jaeger to continue with the task of sculpting the soggy ramen into a model of the Empire State Building.

"I still maintain that it is a pointless, stupid and dull task," Kevin muttered as Mars started off to help the others. "I really can't imagine fans of the IWF, who are more accustomed to watching us fight for our lives in vicious physical conflicts, are going to want to watch this crap."

"Hey, ya know, it ain't so bad," Mars said cheerfully.

"Have you lost your mind?" Terry asked him as he joined them.

"Nah, it's just dat Kiki wasn't talkin' to me back home, but by da time I get outta dis show, she'll be so happy to see me again, she'll forget why she was ever mad."

"Well, good for you. The ramen is dryin' out in the heat of the sun, so ya gotta keep slappin' on some water to the statue to keep it together."

Mars nodded, and set about assisting Terry and Jaeger in their task as Checkmate moved into the shade to check on Dik Dik and Wally.

"Kevin, I gotta go," Kid said to Kevin as he sat down again by the tree Kid was still tied to.

"You're not going anywhere until the task is completed," Kevin told him.

"No man, I mean I gotta go pee," Kid replied.

Kevin turned to glower at Kid for a moment, before shaking his head and turning back to watching the others.

"You'll just have to show some restraint for once in your life," he said.

"Aw Kevin, come on!" Kid moaned, wriggling around against his ties. "I really gotta go!"

"Tough," Kevin said.

"Kevin!"

"No."

"Kevin!"

"No!"

"KEVIN!"

"I said no!"

Kevin sighed moodily, resisting the urge to follow it up with some choice insults against the Kinniku prince, lest they be caught on video and broadcast to the world.

"Aw… Ah… Oh yeah…" Kid groaned.

Kevin slowly turned his head, looking back over his shoulder at Kid, who was suddenly grinning, a blissful expression on his face.

"I'm fine now," Kid assured him.

Kevin tried not to look directly at the growing dark patch at Kid's crotch, instead shifting his attention back to the group, turning his head in time to see Jaeger slap Mars's wrist.

"Hey!" Mars snapped at him.

"You vere going to eat zhat!" Jaeger yelled back.

"We gotta whole mountain o' dis crap, it ain't gonna make any difference if I eat one handful!" Mars argued.

"Don't ya think we'd all like to just eat one handful?" Terry cut in. "But if we all did that now, in a few hours' time, we'd all want another handful, and again and again until the whole dang lot is finished! Start helpin' or we'll tie your ass up to the tree again!"

"Hey, back off Jed Clampett, I'm hungry over here!" Mars snapped back.

"The hell did you just call me?" Terry yelled. "Before you go callin' people names, maybe you oughta take a good long hard look in a mirror, Foghorn Leghorn!"

"Hey, you sure you up to dis task? Dese noddles don't look too much like roots to ya?"

"Shouldn't you be hibernatin' under a rock someplace?"

"Birds don't hibernate, dumbass!"

"I hear bats do though! And you're about as myopic as a bat if you think I'ma let you eat any of this here ramen!"

"Who da hell put you in charge?"

"Stop it, both of you!" Jaeger yelled, leaping between Terry and Mars. "Ve have to vork as a team!"

Mars and Terry muttered a few indecipherable complaints, but otherwise ceased their argument.

"Now shake hands!" Jaeger ordered them.

"I ain't shakin' hands with that sneaky bastard!" Terry yelled, pointing a finger at Mars.

"Hey, you're da sneaky one!" Mars shot back. "All you care about is your damn weddin'! You're plannin' to stab us all in da back and leave dis show so dat you can marry dat dumb blonde o' yours!"

"What did you just call ma girl?" Terry snarled.

"Stop it, stop it, stop it!" Jaeger yelled.

"Hey you shut-up!" Mars snapped at him. "Dis is all your fault anyways! You did dis to us by screwin' around wid da boss!"

"Who cares who caused all of this?" Terry said. "It's too late to blame, let's just concentrate on gettin' the hell outta here!"

"You are plannin' mutiny!" Mars said. "You're gonna make sure dey let you go first!"

"So what if I am? It ain't like you ain't plannin' to do exactly the same damn thing!"

"What is going on here?" Dik Dik asked as he rejoined the group along with Checkmate and Wally.

"We were gettin' along just fine until this asshole started interferin'!" Terry replied, pointing accusingly at Mars.

"You did start us all fighting again, Mars," Jaeger agreed. "Maybe ve should all nominate Mars to leave ze island first, since he just causes trouble."

"That's exactly what he wants us to do, don't give him the satisfaction!" Dik Dik returned, glowering at Mars.

"Hey, you bastards need me here," Mars argued. "I'm a born survivor! You wanna vote somebody off, why not vote for dis little crybaby right here?"

Mars pointed at Terry, who almost erupted with anger.

"Hey, we agreed we was gonna vote Kid Muscle off first!" he screamed.

"What the hell is going on over here?" Kevin Mask demanded, marching up to the group. "Why aren't you all working on that… That…"

Kevin slowly stopped, his pointed finger sinking as his eyes landed on the dishevelled pile of noodles on the sand.

"What the hell is that?" he asked, looking around the others. "That looks more like Mount Fuji than the Empire State Building. Kenyon, what the hell are you playing at here?"

"Hey, why is this my fault?" Terry yelped.

"You're the American, you ought to know what you're doing here!" Kevin pointed out.

"Oh yeah, sure!" Terry drawled. "Cause I'm an American I must know how to make statues outta instant ramen!"

"That's not what I meant!" Kevin yelled.

"Hey, this is a lot tougher'n it looks, Kevin!" Terry sneered. "I'd like to see you do any better!"

"Hey, stop that!" Dik Dik suddenly cried, launching himself into the air.

The others watched as Dik Dik soared towards Mars, who hurriedly stuffed a fistful of ramen into his mouth before Dik Dik collided with him and both men fell to the sand.

"You rotten bastard!" Dik Dik snarled. "I spent hours cooking that foul foodstuff, slaving over a hot fire under the mid-day sun while you relaxed in the shade of the trees!"

"Hey, I didn't ask to be in da shade all day, you bastards tied me up back dere!" Mars argued back, shoving Dik Dik off of himself and struggling to his feet.

"You always ruin everything with your "I'm DMP, no I'm Muscle League, no I'm still DMP" mentality!" Dik Dik snarled, rolling over and grabbing up the steel cooking pot.

Mars started to argue back, but stopped himself as Dik Dik swung the pan at his head. He ducked out of Dik Dik's range, the pan clanging against Kevin's mask with enough force to scare a flock of birds out of the trees.

"Oops…" Dik Dik muttered, attempting to hide the enormous pan behind his back.

Kevin grabbed at his mask to stop the ringing in his head, trying his best to contain his anger and focus on the task at hand.

"Hey, ya cheatin' bastard!" Mars yelled suddenly, grabbing at Terry, who had just munched onto a mouthful of ramen.

"Stop it!" Jaeger yelled, grabbing his arms around Mars's waist to halt his progress.

Mars swung an elbow into the side of Jaeger's head, sending him staggering into Kevin, who finally lost the will to remain calm and focussed, jumping onto Mars's back and sending them both falling forwards, where they landed with a squelch onto the modelled noodles. The others all jumped into the foray in their anger at the statue being destroyed, the situation quickly dissolving into another seven-way brawl.

Twenty minutes later, seven wet and battered Chojins sat by the shore, squeezing the water from their clothing and attempting to straighten themselves out.

"This cannot continue," Kevin insisted, gathering his hair over one shoulder and wringing the excess water from it.

"I can't help myself!" Terry confessed. "If I'd volunteered to be here, it wouldn't be so bad, but I was taken here by force, and I'm gonna miss my own weddin'!"

"We were all taken here by force," Dik Dik pointed out, plucking a something from the water and holding it up curiously. "Did someone lose a pair of underpants?"

"Me!" Jaeger volunteered.

"Why did you take off your underpants?" Wally asked him as he retrieved his clothing from Dik Dik.

"Because ve vere in ze sea!" Jaeger replied with a shrug.

Dik Dik tilted his head to one side, eying Jaeger over.

"You took off your underpants, but not your pants?" he asked.

"And not your boots, or your helmet?" Wally added.

"Herr Brocken alvays says: "dirty underpants lead to a dirty mind"," Jaeger replied.

Dik Dik and Wally both turned very pale.

"Hey, ain't it da other way around?" Mars sniggered. "Ain't it: "a dirty mind leads to dirty underpants"?"

Terry laughed, pointing at Mars.

"Nice one!" he agreed.

"Glad to see you've all recovered from your childish bickering," Kevin mused, sliding his mask back on. "I'm a little disappointed that it takes toilet humour to bring you all together as a group, but at least now we can get back to the task at hand: let's get this stupid model built before sundown."

"Right!" Wally said cheerfully, standing up.

The others all gradually got up and began to follow after Kevin and Wally, who were aiming themselves back in the direction of the model-building site. As they drew nearer to the dying fire and the cooking pot, Kevin and Wally slowed their pace, looking about themselves nervously.

"What happened to the model?" Wally asked.

Kevin paused, staring at the slightly damp area of sand where a few telltale strands of noodle still lay, marking where the statue had stood before the start of the fight. A sickening feeling washed over him, and his head snapped around to the trees, his eyes darting about frantically when he failed to locate Kid Muscle.

"Mantaro!" he yelled, the volume of his voice scaring another flock of birds from the trees.

"What's wrong?" Terry asked, jogging over to join them.

"Oh no!" Jaeger wailed as he saw that the ramen was gone.

"Dat fat pig bastard!" Mars blurted out. "When I find dat little piggy, I'ma take his ass to market!"

Dik Dik turned to Mars, casting him a withering look.

"You're going to do what?" he muttered.

"I say we cut his belly open and take the noodles back ourselves!" Terry shouted. "Who's with me?"

"Wait you guys!" Wally pleaded. "We've got no way of knowing that Kid actually ate all that ramen! And the ramen we stored by the rock pool is still all there!"

"We didn't eat that lot because it has seawater in it!" Dik Dik pointed out. "The first batch, the batch I made, was made with freshwater, and entirely edible!"

"You wasted time cooking it with fresh water?" Kevin wailed. "Are you mad? What were you thinking? That was a waste of time, resources and a potential threat to the task, you had to have known that by making it edible, somebody was bound to eat it?"

"Stop it, all of you!" Jaeger yelled. "Let's not fight again! Ve're vasting energy! Ve ought to be hunting down Kid Muscle!"

"We hath lost half the day already," Checkmate pointed out. "We ought to complete the task with the remaining ramen."

"I don't care about da task no more," Mars said. "I just wanna kill that stinky fat pig!"

"He can't have gone too far," Terry said, wrapping his shirt around the end of a large piece of driftwood. "His belly is full o' food, and he's too much of a damn coward to run too deep into the jungle."

"What the devil are you doing now?" Kevin demanded as Terry moved his shirt towards the fire.

"Makin' torches," Terry replied. "So that we can find that son of a bitch and make him pay!"

"Stop that!" Kevin snapped, kicking the would-be torch from Terry's hands. "Everybody just stop! This is insane we are behaving like animals! Everybody gather up what's left of the ramen and start sculpting! Let's complete the task and get our food. Once we have the food, we can lure Kid Muscle back here with some cow and rice and slap seven shades of shit out of him then."

"Sounds good to me," Dik Dik agreed.

The others nodded and set about the task. Kevin paused, turning to look up at the sky. The sun was roughly halfway down the sky, indicating that it was probably about three quarters of the way through the day, leaving them only a few hours to focus on and successfully complete the task.

"Always, always worse…" he grumbled.

* * *

"What's that you've got there, Doc?"

"These are caffeine tablets Mac, and this is an espresso maker."

"Combining caffeine tablets with concentrated coffee: a wise strategy Doc?"

"You tell me Mac. You're the one who kept falling asleep during the last segment."

Mac nodded his head, turning to the small monitor at his side that told him they had another two minutes and twenty-six seconds before the commercial break ended.

"Gimme some," he said flatly.

Doc slid a mug of viscous black liquid towards his colleague and handed him a box of white pills.

"I'm not getting any younger Mac, I don't think I can sustain 24-hour commentary for the next eight weeks," Doc said.

"You're telling me," Mac replied. "By the time we get back home, I guarantee my wife will have burned my suits and slashed the leather in my new Subaru."

"I can't remember how many grandchildren I have…" Doc said with a sigh. "And I'm starting to forget how old my children are. But that might just be these pills."

"Really? Maybe I'll take some more then."

"Hey, I think I see Kid Muscle."

"Oh yeah? Think we should tell Kevin Mask?"

"Let's just send a camera down there and broadcast what he does. It keeps the show interesting if he's running away and hiding and acting like a fool."

"I don't really care about keeping this show interesting, I just want to go home."

"I don't care about the show either, but I figure if we keep ourselves interested, staying awake should be easier."

"Good point, Doc."

"Welcome back fight fans, and boy have we got an exciting show for your today!"

Mac arched his eyebrows at Doc's cheerful tone, but Doc merely shrugged in reply.

"Can our heroes complete today's task: Mac, your thoughts?"

Mac hurriedly gulped down some coffee.

"It doesn't look good, Doc, it doesn't look good," he recovered. "With half the materials gone and only seven bodies on the job, things aren't look too good for the Muscle League."

"And in case you're just tuning in today, let's take a look at the replay of the earlier events that led to this dilemma."

Roxanne stiffened as the image on the television changed to show seven Chojins beating into each other whilst Kid Muscle tip-toed across to the large mound of ramen they had been working with. She cringed as Kid literally buried his head into the noodles and began sucking them up, his actions entirely undetected by his fellow contestants.

"He is such a selfish…" Roxanne began, gripping her fists at her sides angrily.

"Oh Roxanne, he must have been starving!" Marie tried, squeezing Roxanne's knee reassuringly. "All that time with no proper food, the smell of the warm ramen was obviously just too much for him! All the others were all trying to eat it too!"

"He's an idiot!" Roxanne wailed. "He always talks about how he can't wait to be a father, but when he can't even look after himself, how can I expect him to look after a child?"

Meat blinked at Roxanne, the sight of Marie shaking her head at him doing little to reassure the mounting anxiety within the pit of his stomach.

"I can't take this any more!" Roxanne said decisively. "And Trixie should have been back by now! I'm going to talk to Jacqueline myself!"

"Oh Roxanne, I don't know if that's a good idea!" Marie began.

"Yeah Roxanne," Meat said slowly. "Shouldn't you be taking it easy… In your condition… Taking it easy…"

Marie turned to Meat with a frown and he hurriedly grinned innocently, shrugging his shoulders.

"Tell Kiki I've gone to talk to Jack," Roxanne said as she pulled on her coat. "And tell her that if I'm not back before dinner, I've failed, and I need her to come and help me out."

"Oh Roxanne!" Marie said, standing up. "Do be careful!"

Roxanne nodded her head before marching out, leaving Marie watching her anxiously and Meat staring dumbly at the image of Kid Muscle scooping the last of the ramen statue into his mouth, sand and all, grinning shamelessly at his act of treachery.

"Another generation of Kinnikus, huh?" he muttered.

"What was that?" Marie asked, turning to him.

"Oh, nothin'!" Meat hurriedly replied. "I was just thinkin' out loud."

* * *

"Jack!"

Jacqueline sighed, smiling at the reporter in front of her.

"Would you excuse me for just a moment?" she said gently.

"Certainly ma'am," the reporter replied.

Jacqueline stood up and turned around, finding a tearful Roxanne Kinniku hurrying towards her.

"Roxanne!" she greeted her. "What's up?"

"What's up?" Roxanne echoed. "You sent my husband to a desert island with no food or water or shelter, that's "what's up"!"

"It's called entertainment, Roxanne," Jacqueline patiently explained. "It's called good business. I wouldn't expect you to understand."

"Jacqueline, please, don't do this!" Roxanne insisted. "I… I kinda need Kid with me right now, it's hard to explain."

Jacqueline tilted her head to one side curiously.

"Look I…" Roxanne began, chewing at her lip nervously. "I'm kinda having a bit of "family issue" right now, and I really need Mantaro back here with me soon… I can't really talk about it, because I haven't exactly told Mantaro about it yet, I didn't want to over-excite him until everything was… Certain."

Jacqueline began to smile, nodding her understanding.

"I see," she said. "Follow me, I think I can help you out."

"Oh thank you Jack!" Roxanne gushed.

Roxanne smiled and sighed in relief, following after Jacqueline.

* * *

"You conniving bitch!" Roxanne screamed, slapping her hands against the firmly locked closed door.

"Hey, welcome to the party Rox!" Trixie said. "We were wondering when you would get here."

Roxanne turned around, starting in surprise as she found that Jacqueline's security guards had in fact deposited her into a room with three other people.

"Girls, this is Roxanne Kinniku, Kid Muscle's wife," Trixie explained. "Roxanne, this is Amy MacLeod, Kevin Mask's girlfriend, and this is Sally Van Dik, Dik Dik's wife."

Roxanne cocked her head, her mouth opening but words failing her.

"I'm here because I can't post-pone my wedding," Trixie said. "Amy's here because she needs to tell Kevin something urgent and Sally's here because this a critical time for her and Dik Dik. And even though we've all explained ourselves to Ikeman, he's done nothing to confront his sister or to get us out of here."

"I told Jacqueline about…" Roxanne began, wringing her hands together nervously.

"About what?" Trixie asked.

"Well… It's a bit personal, I didn't want to tell anyone else until I had a chance to tell Mantaro…" Roxanne replied. "I knew he'd be… Really hyper once he found out, and I wanted it to be a quiet affair…"

"Oh!" Trixie gasped. "So then it's really…?"

Roxanne nodded her head.

"Oh wow, that's awesome Roxanne!" Trixie said cheerfully.

"You're pleased?" Roxanne asked. "Really? Even though you… Y'know…?"

"Of course I'm pleased!"

"I was worried you might think I was sorta stealing your thunder, what with your wedding and… Everything."

"Oh no, not at all, I think it's great! And so exciting! Have you told King Muscle yet?"

"No, I figured he'd be as hyper as Kid once he found out…"

"Of course!"

"Well… I guess it's good that we've got each other in here… And Kiki is still free, I'm sure she'll help us out of here."

"After the way she handled Edward Mask, I think Kiki will definitely be our saviour."

"I hope so!"

* * *

"Hey ya know, that ain't half bad!" Terry said cheerfully.

"As long as they don't fail us for eating half of the ramen, we should be just fine!" Dik Dik agreed.

"It's a little lop-sided, but I am impressed," Kevin said with a nod of his head.

"I'm so hungry right now I could eat a horse," Mars groaned. "And I mean da whole damn horse, tail, hooves and all."

Mars caught Kevin eying him contemptuously and his grinned.

"Not your horse, Kev," he added. "Dere ain't enough meat on her to satisfy an appetite like mine…"

"Careful," Kevin warned him.

Mars grinned, flicking his middle finger at Kevin, who shook his head and rolled his eyes in response.

"I think we did it, you guys!" Wally said. "And just in time too, the sun is setting!"

The others all looked out to sea, watching the sun sinking into the horizon for a moment before all turning their attention back to the noodle sculpture stood before them; which was suddenly obscured in shadow.

"Hey you guys," Kid said meekly. "Nice job on the… Thing…"

The others all glared at Kid, who was picking his nose as he admired their hard work, apparently oblivious to the food stains around his masked mouth.

"Did ya come back to eat the rest of it and really fuck us over?" Mars sneered.

"Aw dude, come on!" Kid implored. "I was hungry! And besides, it looks like you fixed it anyway!"

"Yeah, no thanks to you!" Terry snapped.

"Let's not start this again," Kevin quickly interjected. "McMadd, we've finished the task, now give us our food!" he yelled up at the green sphere carrying Doc and Mac.

A few seconds later, another rock smacked against Kevin's masked head and fell to the ground.

"I'll get it!" Kid volunteered, walking around the sculpture and bending over to retrieve the rock.

"Oh shit, no!" Terry squeaked an instant before Kid let out an enormous fart.

The others all squeaked out noises of horror as their ramen model was blasted apart, the noodles mostly falling into the sea and disappearing from sight.

"You… You…" Mars began, pointing at Kid.

Kid slowly straightened, looking back over his shoulder at the mess he had created.

"It doesn't smell that bad, you've done worse!" Kid concluded, turning back to Mars and shaking his head. "The note says: Kevin Mask please nominate a member of the group to present the model to the judges."

Kid looked up from the note, finding seven Chojins glaring at him with what could only be described as a look of pure bloodlust.

"Guys?" he asked meekly, looking around them all.

"Gentlemen, on tonight's menu we got roast pork served wid coconut milk…" Mars growled out.

"Huh?" Kid echoed, taking a wary step back as all seven began advancing towards him. "Hey… You guys… C'mon… This isn't funny… Ah!"

Kid turned and fled, but with seven starved and half crazed Chojins chasing him, his chances of escape did not seem too good.

* * *

**Next Chapter:** It's "Discussion Day" on the island, and even though the gang refuse to participate, they soon find themselves debating the day's topic regardless. Mars in make-up, Terry in a skirt and Kid's pin-cushion, it all adds up to one simple thing: the Muscle League are going mad…** Chapter 5 – Information is Power**.


	5. Information is Power

**A/N:** Sorry for the delayed updates for anyone who was waiting. Also, just to reiterate: this fic is guaranteed to offend at least one person at least once, so read at your own peril.

_Campfire Song_ from SpongeBob SquarePants (again). Towlie is the pot-smokin' towel from _South Park_. P Diddy is the most annoying man alive. _Urecco_ is a Japanese porn mag (similar to _Playboy_ and the likes).

**Recap:** Kid ate half of the ramen needed to complete the day's task, came back when the others had made a recovery and farted onto their work, destroying it and costing the group their gamble. Since this meant our heroes would face a week of living on a fifty percent food budget, they decided to kill Kid Muscle and eat him.

* * *

**Chapter 5 – Information is Power**

"Are you sure these are edible?" Kevin asked, eying Dik Dik sceptically, silently wondering when it was that the gazelleman had sprouted a third horn.

"Do you care?" Dik Dik replied. "All we have is a medium-sized bag of mixed vegetables, a large fruit bowl and a stack of pork to last us throughout the next week. We have to subsidise it somehow."

"Zhese mushrooms are making me sick!" Jaeger complained, grabbing at his stomach.

"I dunno about sick, but I'm startin' to feel like Towlie over here," Terry commented. "Dik Dik, ain't these the same mushrooms you said were a bit funny?"

"Do you care?" Dik Dik replied. "All we have is a medium-sized bag of mixed vegetables, a large fruit bowl and a stack of pork to last us throughout the next week. We have to subsidise it somehow."

"Dese mushrooms are messin' wid my head, Bambi!" Mars yelled at him. "You lied to us! Dese ain't da safe ones!"

"Do you care?" Dik Dik replied. "All we have is a medium-sized bag of mixed vegetables, a large fruit bowl and a stack of pork to last us throughout the next week. We have to subsidise it somehow."

"Is it just me, or is the sky spinning a little?" Wally asked. "The stars look like they're shooting about the sky."

"Tis a very unique taste this fungus doth have, Dik Dik," Checkmate said. "Are you certain they are delectable edibles?"

"Do you care?" Dik Dik replied. "All we have is a medium-sized bag of mixed vegetables, a large fruit bowl and a stack of pork to last us throughout the next week. We have to subsidise it somehow."

"I think I'll just stick with the pork," Kevin concluded, flicking away a half-eaten mushroom. "I'm starting to feel diddy over here."

"You're what?" Mars echoed.

"I feel giddy," Kevin replied.

"You said "diddy"," Jaeger pointed out.

"Like P Diddy?" Terry asked.

Wally snorted.

"Kevin's feeling Diddy!" he sniggered.

"Yeah!" Terry snorted. "Kevin likes to feel Diddy!"

"Zhat's not even funny," Jaeger said.

"Then why are ya laughin'?" Mars asked him.

"I'm not laughing!" Jaeger replied.

"Yes you are," Checkmate said.

"Nein, I'm crying."

"Hey, what?" Terry echoed. "Why would ya admit to cryin'? Why didn't ya pretend you was laughin'?"

"I don't know vhy I'm cryin'!" Jaeger wailed. "I'm not sad!"

"Maybe you miss that McMadd woman," Kevin suggested.

"Somebody stick some o' dat pork on da fire!" Mars ordered. "Dese mushrooms are shit!"

"Do you care?" Dik Dik replied. "All we have is a medium-sized bag of mixed vegetables, a large fruit bowl and a stack of pork to last us throughout the next week. We have to subsidise it somehow."

"Would you… Would you stop that?" Kevin stammered, turning to Dik Dik. "It's getting terribly irksome."

"Terribly irksome?" Terry repeated. "Dang, you're an anal-retentive son of a bitch, Kev! Just tell it like it is! Dik Dik, stop repeatin' yourself, you're pissin' us all off!"

"Hey, what happened to Kid Muscle?" Wally asked.

"We killed him, didn't we?" Dik Dik replied, pointing at the piles of raw pork meat behind the group.

"Huh?" Mars echoed. "I remember beatin' on him to tenderise his flesh, but I don't remember actually killin' his ass."

"Didn't ve stop because he pooped on Kevin's leg?" Jaeger asked.

Kevin looked down at himself, finding that he was dressed in only a T-shirt and his boxer shorts.

"I appear to have lost my trousers and my boots," he announced.

"I've lost my shirt," Terry added, slapping a hand at his bare chest.

"I've lost my head," Jaeger moaned.

"I've lost my mind," Dik Dik groaned.

"I've lost my appetite," Wally sighed, throwing his mushrooms into the fire.

"This sucks," Checkmate said.

The others all fell silent, staring at him in disbelief.

"Well, tis true," he defended himself. "This doth suck."

The others grumbled out a variety of complaints, only ceasing when the faint sound of a badly tuned banjo began infiltrating the air around them.

"Terry, stop that!" Kevin said.

"Hey, what the hell?" Terry yelped. "What makes ya think that noise is comin' from me?"

"Well, you're a sort of banjo-playing, beer-drinking, bull-riding kind of… Cowboy," Kevin replied.

"Oh yeah? Well it ain't me makin' that racket, and I may well be a banjo-playin', beer-drinkin', bull-ridin' kinda cowboy, but you play the violin, you limp-wristed nancy-boy!"

"How dare you? I haven't played the violin in more than thirteen… days."

"You play da violin?" Mars asked, quirking an eyebrow at Kevin.

"Yes I do," Kevin replied. "And I'll have you know that some people rather like my… Violining."

Mars began to snort into his hand, but the sound of banjo-like music had grown louder, and a few seconds later, a lone figure stepped into the light of the fire.

"Let's gather round the campfire, and sing our campfire song," a voice sang. "Our C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song."

"What the hell?" Terry muttered.

"And if you think that we can't sing it faster then you're wrong, but it'll help if you just sing along…"

"Where the hell did you get a banjo from?" Kevin asked.

"C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!"

"I think he made it himself," Wally offered.

"C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!"

"Out of vines, a stick and a coconut," Dik Dik added.

"And if you think that we can't sing it faster then you're wrong, but it'll help if you just sing along!"

"Remind me why we didn't kill Kid Muscle?" Kevin asked anyone who cared to listen.

"C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!" Kid sang gleefully, plucking away at his homemade banjo. "Wally!"

"C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!" Wally sang.

The others glowered at him, and he hurriedly clamped a hand over his mouth.

"Dik Dik!" Kid cried.

"C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!" Dik Dik sang.

"Jaeger!"

"C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song!" Jaeger sang.

"Kevin!"

Kevin glared blankly at Kid, who grinning endlessly in reply.

"Good, Kevin!" he said cheerfully. "C-A-M-P-F-I-R-E-S-O-N-G song, and if you think that we can't sing it faster then you're wrong, but it'll help if you just sing along! Terry!"

"F-U-C-K-O-F-F-P-O-R-K-Y pig!" Terry sang.

"Hey, those aren't the words!" Kid protested. "Mars!"

"K-I-S-S-M-Y-A-S-S-P-I-G boy!" Mars sang.

"Hey, do it properly!" Kid whined. "Checkmate!"

"Y-O-U-S-U-C-K-F-A-T-T-Y pig!" Checkmate sang.

"Wally, show 'em how it's done!" Kid huffed, turning back to Wally.

"K-I-D-S-A-D-U-M-B-A-S-S pig!" Wally sang.

"Hey! Dik Dik!"

"K-I-D-W-A-N-K-S-A-L-O-T yeah!" Dik Dik sang.

"Hoi! Jaeger!"

"K-I-D-C-A-N-T-S-P-E-L-L no!" Jaeger sang.

"What? Kevin!"

"Kid, shut the hell up, can't you tell that everyone is making fun of you?" Kevin snapped irritably.

"Huh?" Kid echoed, his hand slipping against his poorly made banjo, creating an atonal twang.

"Put the banjo away, or you will be wearing it," Kevin warned him.

"But I'm not sleepy!" Kid complained, stamping his feet.

"I didn't say go to sleep, I just said put the bloody banjo away!"

"You're such a boring old asshole," Kid grumbled, flinging his new toy away from the campfire.

"Y'know, maybe sleep ain't such a bad idea," Terry suggested. "Maybe tomorrow somethin' good'll happen, like a tsunami that'll wash us all away to another country."

"We can but hope," Dik Dik replied.

* * *

Jacqueline stifled a yawn as she entered the studio. It was still very early, but already the start of the third day of _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_. So far, the ratings for the show had been phenomenal, and the tabloid newspapers were producing some interesting headlines – most of which Jacqueline had cut out and kept, as they had given her some interesting ideas for future trials and events she could force upon the Muscle League.

"Kiki!" she yelped as she almost walked into the diminutive green-eyed girl, who was standing stiffly glaring at her expectantly by the green screen, almost camouflaged against it.

"Jacqueline, Roxanne never came home last night," Kiki began. "The last time anyone saw her, she was on her way here to talk to you. What happened? Where is she? And where is Trixie? It's bad enough you've imprisoned the Muscle League, if you lock up the girls, you're no better than Edward Mask!"

"Edward Mask you say…?" Jacqueline said, rubbing her chin thoughtfully.

"Jacqueline, please!" Kiki begged. "Where is Roxanne? And when can I expect to see my boyfriend again?"

"Kiki, it's no secret that you and Mars aren't exactly seeing eye-to-eye right now," Jacqueline began. "I would have thought that you, of all the girls, would have been quite glad to be rid of your man at a time like this."

"You don't understand," Kiki sighed. "I need Mars back here, there's something he has to do."

"I don't follow."

"Well… Look, it's really a private matter, and it's certainly none of your business. You'll find out soon enough what it's all about, but for now I'd rather not talk about it with anyone but Mars, because for now, it's just between me and him!"

Jacqueline began to grin in a way that made Kiki suddenly apprehensive.

"What are you planning now?" Kiki asked.

"It's perfect…" Jacqueline whispered, touching her hands to Kiki's shoulders. "What a perfect way to increase the viewing figures… All eight contestants have got a little something going on in their lives, and once I reveal it to the world, _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ will become the most popular programme on television ever!"

"What are you talking about now?" Kiki wailed.

"Come with me, Kiki," Jacqueline said slyly.

"Um… Okay…"

Kiki reluctantly followed after Jacqueline, gulping quietly as two security guards began to follow them.

* * *

"Hey!" Kiki cried. "You tricked me, Jacqueline McMadd!"

"Damn it Kiki, you were meant to not get caught and to get us all out of here!"

Kiki spun around, yelping at what she saw.

"Trixie?" she said. "Roxanne? Amy? Sally? Dorothy? What are you guys all doing here?"

"I'm taking a stab in the dark here, but it looks like we all have the same problem," Amy replied. "We all came here to get our men back off the island, because we all need them with us for the same reason."

"What, really?" Kiki asked. "You need to get Kid Muscle, Terry, Dik Dik, Kevin and Wally back for the same reason I need Mars back?"

"Holy crap Kiki, not you too!" Roxanne yelped.

"There must be something in the water…" Trixie muttered.

"Oh wow, that is strange," Sally commented.

"They can't keep us here!" Dorothy complained. "Not with all of the… Y'know…"

Kiki slowly nodded, making her way over to sit next to Roxanne.

"This is so weird…" she muttered as she sat down.

"It gets worse," Roxanne said with a smile. "Jacqueline's… Y'know… Got the same problem!"

"What?" Kiki echoed.

"Totally!" Trixie agreed, leaning past Roxanne to grin at Kiki. "Can you believe it?"

"No!" Kiki replied. "It doesn't make any sense!"

Trixie shrugged her shoulders.

"Does anything involving the IWF ever make any sense?" she asked.

"I guess not," Kiki agreed.

"Good morning, ladies!" Jacqueline said cheerfully, leaping into the room.

"Let's kill her!" Trixie suggested, standing up and rolling up her sleeves.

"I'm up for that idea," Amy agreed, standing up.

"Why don't you hear me out, instead?" Jacqueline suggested.

The girls all eyed her sceptically, but Trixie and Amy eventually sat back down, and Jacqueline began to talk.

* * *

"What's going on in there, don't you have audio on that room?" Ikeman whined as he watched a security camera filming his sister talking to the six females she had imprisoned within a secure room.

"No audio Sir, but surely it's obvious what they're talking about?" a security guard said to Ikeman.

"No, not at all!" Ikeman moaned, moodily crossing his arms over his chest.

"Well, it's hormones isn't it?"

"Yeah, all those silly girls together with their periods!"

"That's not what I meant, Sir. It's a lot more complicated than that."

"It's what?"

Ikeman frowned at the security guard, who was grinning at him cheerfully.

"How can I put this, Sir?" he said slowly. "Technically speaking, there are more than seven people in that room…"

Ikeman frowned, quickly counting the seven occupants of the room.

"More than… Seven…" he muttered pensively.

"The stork is going to be carrying a very big burden in a few months' time, Mister McMadd," the security guard said.

Ikeman slowly lifted his eyes from the monitor, a grin slowly spreading across his face until it reached maniacal proportions.

"Perfect…" he said, rubbing his hands together slyly. "I've just found the perfect way to sabotage my little sister's little show!"

* * *

"Hey, do we get any groomin' equipment?"

Kevin turned sharply to Mars, eying him over in concern.

"What-what do you mean?" he asked nervously.

"What do ya think I mean?" Mars asked, pointing at the coating of facial hair he had acquired.

"Oh, I see," Kevin said, nodding his head. "I thought you meant a…"

Kevin stopped himself, his eyes catching sight of the helicopter camera loitering above them.

"Well, maybe we could ask the flying rocks about that," he instead said.

"What about toothbrushes?" Terry asked. "My teeth are furrier than Wally's ass over here!"

"A delightful analogy," Kevin replied. "I'll ask the rocks."

"What about alcohol?" Kid asked.

"Hey, you already sing and dance real bad when nobody wants ya too, what do ya need booze for?" Mars asked him.

"I thought maybe we could just drink until we forget how crap this island is," Kid replied.

"Not a bad idea," Dik Dik said.

"Hey rocks," Kevin called up to the sky. "Can we have some razors, some toothbrushes, some shaving foam, some toothpaste and as much alcohol as possible?"

"Ask it for a mirror, we need a mirror," Mars insisted.

"You ask it!" Kevin snapped.

"The rocks only answer you, Kevin," Dik Dik pointed out.

"They do?" Kevin muttered.

Before Kevin could give the matter too much thought, a rock smacked against his mask and fell into his lap. Touching one hand to his mask to still the ringing, he pulled the latest note from the rock with his other hand.

"Let's see here…" he said. "Kevin Mask, no alcohol will be provided to you under any circumstances. Toiletries will be provided upon the successful completion of your next task, details of which will be announced tomorrow morning."

"Tomorrow?" Mars groaned. "But I'm gettin' hairy, here!"

"Ain't we all," Terry added, rubbing his fingers against his cheeks.

"What do you guys think tomorrow's task will be?" Wally asked anyone who cared to listen.

"Probably to whittle icons of Jacqueline McMadd out of coconut shells using toothpicks…" Kevin grumbled.

Kevin sighed, before yelping out in alarm as another, unexpected, rock clattered against his head, once more falling into his lap.

"Oh God, I was only joking about the whittling," he moaned. "Please don't tell me that is actually the task."

Kevin plucked the note from the rock, skimming through it quickly.

"Is it the task?" Terry asked.

Kevin read through the note again, studying each word a little more carefully to ensure he had understood the message correctly.

"Lemme guess, it's worse dan dat?" Mars offered.

Kevin read the note again, studying each word at great length, feeling increasingly sick with each word he saw.

"Vot is it, Kevin?" Jaeger asked cautiously.

"Kevin Mask, today is discussion day," Kevin slowly read aloud. "Every second day, you will be given a topic to discuss and debate amongst yourselves. Today's topic is: homophobia. Are you homophobic, or do you know anyone who is? How does this make you feel? Feel free to include any homoerotic fantasies or experiences of your own in the discussion."

Kevin slowly lifted his eyes, finding the others all glaring at him with wide eyes.

"I refuse to play this game," Dik Dik said stubbornly. "They can't make us do it, and since there is nothing to be gained from doing it, I decline."

"Agreed," Kevin said, tearing the note apart. "It's bad enough we've had our freedom taken from us, they can't now tell us how to act and what to say."

A short, awkward silence passed, during which all eight Chojins avoided looking at each other.

"I kissed a boy vonce."

Kevin and Mars turned sharply to Jaeger, who appeared completely happy with his previous statement.

"Vhen I vas young," he continued. "I met him at ze shop I got my sausages from. Ve vere both starting to notice girls, and ve decided to practise kissing."

"S-sausages?" Kid blurted. "The boy gave you his sausage?"

Kid snorted and giggled into his hands, and Wally shook his head in disgust.

"That's exactly the attitude the rock was talking about, Kid!" he said. "You're homophobic. If Jaeger had told you he practised kissing with a girl he met at the shop, you wouldn't be laughing now, would you?"

"No, because that would be awesome!" Kid replied.

"Wally's right Kid, why are ya mockin' Jaeger for kissin' a boy?" Terry asked. "Yet you say it's awesome for him to kiss a girl. What difference does it make?"

"Well, dude, come on!" Kid groaned. "My dad always told me that in this life, there are two types of people: pins and cushions. And us guys have all got pins so that we can stick it to the cushions!"

"Kid, that is a horrible analogy!" Kevin snapped. "Why did you repeat that on live television?"

"What?" Kid echoed, shrugging innocently. "Are you guys all saying you wouldn't mind taking another guy's pin in your cushion?"

"Aw for fuck's sake!" Mars barked, standing up and shaking his head. "Why don't you shut-up, ya little hypocrite? Of everybody here, you're da most gay! You're da one who can't keep his hands offa my cushion, and lemme tell ya, you ever put your pin anywhere near any part o' me, I'ma kill you!"

"You're always very aggressive and overtly womanising," Dik Dik observed. "Mars, you're a classic closet homosexual."

"What?" Mars yelped.

"I always thought twas Kevin that was gay," Checkmate casually commented.

"What?" Kevin snapped, rounding on him.

"Doomsmane and Skulldozer took bets on it," Checkmate added.

Kevin began to feel sick again.

"But… Why?" he wailed.

"Well, y'know…" Mars muttered.

Kevin turned to Mars, glowering up at him.

"What did you say to them, bird-face?" Kevin snarled.

"Well Kev, I took ya to Da Palace, and ya didn't even look at da girls…" Mars said with a shrug.

"Yeah, and now you're totally stuffing my chef's cushion," Kid added.

Kevin dived at Kid, who by a miracle managed to leap out of harm's way.

"You leave Amy out of this, you nasty little turd!" Kevin warned him.

"Chef's name was Amy?" Kid asked. "See, that even sounds like a girl's name!"

"That's because it is a girl's name!" Kevin argued back.

"Well there you go, Kevin!" Kid sighed. "You're stuffing cushions with some guy called Amy, so it's not like you can really deny that you're gay any more!"

"Amy is a woman, you ugly, fat bastard!" Kevin erupted, leaping at Kid again.

Kid once more scooted out of harm's way, eying Kevin incredulously.

"Chef was a woman?" he asked. "Really? But… Really?"

"How could you not notice that she was a woman, you stupid, idiotic, pig-faced arse!"

"Dude, are you sure chef was a woman?"

"Absolutely, one hundred percent sure!"

Kid turned to Mars, who shrugged his shoulders.

"She ain't exactly pretty, but she did have a decent rack," he said.

"Stop it, right now!" Kevin demanded, standing abruptly. "Nobody is to mention Amy again, you hear?"

"Kevin is a homophobe too," Dik Dik said casually. "He hates his brother, and his brother is gay."

"I hate my brother because he's an annoying little prick who has tried to kill me several times, and even tried to kill my…"

Kevin paused, clearing his throat awkwardly.

"Your what, Kevin?" Dik Dik asked, smirking up at Kevin.

"He tried to kill Amy," Kevin said quietly.

"You never talk much about your girl, Kev," Terry commented. "And I ain't never heard you call her your girl."

"I'm not a miserable little boy like you lot all are!" Kevin snapped back. "I don't need showy, false, exhibitionist…"

Kevin cleared his throat again, and Terry and Dik Dik grinned.

"I reckon Kevin is in denial about his sexuality," Terry proposed. "He just keeps a girl around to stop the rumours. He did let that pretty pop-boy Nick Hasler film his sappy l'il music video at his house."

"Dat would make sense, ya know," Mars said, to Kevin's horror. "I imagine if Kev was gay, he'd wanna get himself a man who looks just like he does, cause Kev is a bit of a vain son of a bitch, ya know what I'm sayin'?"

"What?" Kevin roared. "I'm vain? You're the one who can't live without a mirror! You wear more make-up than your stupid little girlfriend does!"

The others all turned abruptly to Mars, who paled for a moment before laughing and shaking his head.

"Dat ain't true!" he said.

"That's the real reason Mars needs a mirror on this island!" Kevin told the others. "His mascara is smudging!"

"Hey, shut-up!" Mars snapped. "I ain't never worn no mascara!"

"I think you meant to say eye-liner, Kevin," Dik Dik muttered.

"Eye-liner then!" Kevin said, pointing at Mars.

Mars faltered for a moment and the others began chuckling to themselves.

"Hey, I'm completely comfortable wid my sexuality over here!" Mars insisted. "I know exactly what I like and what I don't like, and I ain't go no problem talkin' about it neither."

"So… You wear make-up?" Kid asked.

"You wear a rubber mask dat smells like dog shit!" Mars replied.

"I sometimes like to wear a sarong on a hot day," Terry commented.

"Isn't that a type of bra?" Kid asked.

"No Kid, don't be stupid!" Wally corrected him. "It's frilly panties, isn't it?"

"What?" Terry yelped.

"Why da hell am I stuck on an island wid a bunch sexually repressed children?" Mars yelled up at Doc and Mac's aircraft. "Hey, ain't dere usually a buzzword on dese dumb shows? Like uh, I dunno, "I'm too beautiful to be stuck here, send me home"?"

"Isn't it "I'm a celebrity, get me out of here"?" Dik Dik asked.

"I plead insanity, get me out of here!" Kevin yelled at the green sphere.

"I like profanity, get me out of here!" Kid tried.

"I want immunity, get me outta here!" Terry yelled.

All eight Chojins watched the sky for a prolonged period of time, but their demands were met with silence.

"Can't we at least have a book of sudoku puzzles or something?" Kevin asked meekly.

"Sudoku?" Kid echoed. "Is that anything like Urecco?"

"Urecco?" Kevin repeated, squinting at Kid curiously.

"It's a dirty magazine," Mars offered. "Ask da rocks if we can have some."

"I'm not asking them for that!" Kevin snapped. "You lot are all filthy enough without added stimuli!"

"What?" Terry yelped. "Geez Kev, d'ya ever stop an' listen to yourself?"

"Just shut-up, all of you!" Kevin retorted. "Rocks, give us something to do, we're bored!"

All eight Chojins once more turned expectantly to the sky. As a large box began to fall towards them, Dik Dik tilted his head curiously.

"How do they fit all that stuff into that little ball with Doc and Mac?" he asked.

"Who cares?" Kevin replied, approaching the box which had, mercifully, not fallen on his head as the rocks usually did.

"What is it, Kevin?" Kid asked.

Kevin tore open part of the box, hesitating as he caught sight of the contents.

"What the…" he muttered.

"Is that clean clothes?" Dik Dik asked, running towards the box. "Thank God for that!"

"What are you talking about?" Kevin snorted, eying him over. "You don't wear clothes!"

"I wasn't meaning for me…" Dik Dik said darkly.

Together, Dik Dik and Kevin turned to Kid Muscle, who was littered in a variety of stains, most of which neither wished to know the exact origin of.

"You're right," Kevin replied.

"Hey, there's a note!" Wally said cheerfully, retrieving the piece of paper taped to one side of the box. "It says "T-shirt Design Kit"."

Wally lifted his eyes to Kevin and Dik Dik, but both were turned to Kid Muscle once more.

"Aw sweet!" Kid rejoiced. "Now I can make everyone a new T-shirt!"

"Always worse," Kevin grumbled.

* * *

**Next Chapter:** Jacqueline interviews Meat and the woman left behind, but when their comments are sent to the Muscle League, nobody hears quite what they expected, and more secrets are revealed and more fighting breaks out; but at least it's voting time to decide who will leave the island. **Chapter 6 – Playing Games.**


	6. Playing Games

**Recap:** The castaways had their first discussion day on the island, and back at HQ, the girls plotted against an increasingly evil Jacqueline McMadd.

* * *

**Chapter 6 – Playing Games**

"I've been married to Mantaro Kinniku for a little over fours months now, but I've known him for about four years. We started dating just before the Generation X tournament, and although we split up for a while, we got back together during the Chojin Crown and we got married in October last year. Unfortunately, my wedding ceremony was a bit of a disaster, because I was kidnapped and taken prisoner by the DMP, but Mantaro came to my rescue, and we've been inseparable ever since… Wait, no, we were inseparable, but now he's on a desert island somewhere as part of this show…"

"And Roxanne, tell the viewers at home how you felt when Kid Muscle not only ate half of the ramen for yesterday's task on _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ but then ruined the model built by farting on it?"

"I've thought a lot about that. I've had nothing better to do, because I've been sitting right here, at the IWF headquarters in Tokyo, waiting for this stupid show to end and for my husband to come home. And I have decided that if I had been dumped on a desert island against my will, without food, water or shelter, I would have done exactly what Mantaro did."

"You would have farted onto the statue, made a banjo and started singing songs from a children's programme?"

"Don't get smart with me Jacqueline, I only agreed to do this interview because you said after this goes on the show, you will bring forward the eviction day, and send one of the men back home!"

Jacqueline sighed, rolling her eyes.

"Fine Roxanne," she said.

"No it's not," Roxanne coldly replied. "You're a sneaky, lying, cheating, dirty, despicable, nasty horror of a human being, and that fin on your head is really starting to piss me off! I hate you! I can't believe I ever thought otherwise! I even invited you to my wedding! I thought we were friends! What about everything we went through with The Anarchists, didn't you learn anything from all of that?"

"I'm ready for my next interviewee," Jacqueline told a security guard, who nodded and started towards Roxanne.

"Don't touch me, I'm not about to cause any trouble!" Roxanne warned him, rising to her feet.

"Before you do go Roxanne, just do me one last favour," Jacqueline said sweetly. "Take a look into that camera right there and say a little something. Something you would like us to show to Kid Muscle, a little message for him."

Roxanne paused, eying Jacqueline sceptically before turning to her bulky security guard.

"Don't worry, nobody is going to hurt you," Jacqueline insisted. "I just thought that it was only fair to give you the chance to send a message to your husband."

"Okay…" Roxanne said, turning to the camera. "Mantaro, I've been watching the show, day and night. I've hardly slept, I'm really worried about you out there, and I really miss you. Please try to be… A little more considerate of the others, especially Mars and Kevin. Please take good care of yourself and the others, and I really hope you can come home soon, because… I have some really exciting news for you, I just know you'll be as happy as I am when you hear what's ahead of us."

"Okay, that's enough of that, I think we have what we need," Jacqueline said.

Roxanne turned sharply, stumbling back nervously as the security guard advanced towards her.

"Come on Roxanne, let's get a coffee," Marie said gently, taking Roxanne's arm and guiding her away from the studio set Jacqueline had arranged for conducting the interviews.

"Right…" Roxanne agreed.

"Hey Jacqueline, maybe this isn't such a good idea," Meat said, approaching the temporary chairman. "The girls are… Well, y'know…"

"Meat, perfect!" Jacqueline greeted him. "You're my next guest!"

"I am?" Meat echoed incredulously.

"Yes, take a seat."

Meat hesitated, and Jacqueline responded with a short laugh.

"My mistake," she said. "Can someone bring a booster seat out here for the little man?" she called out across the studio.

"Never mind that!" Meat said angrily, clambering up into the director's chair to face Jacqueline.

"Okay," Jacqueline said. "So, Meat, you are Kid Muscle's manager, and something of a mentor to the Muscle League as a whole. How does it feel to watch them all on _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_?"

"I feel like the boys are missing hours of training time, and the essentials of a healthy diet, both of which are necessary elements in a superhuman wrestler's life to keep him prepared to fight evil!" Meat tightly replied.

"How did it feel to see the entire Muscle League turn against your man, Kid Muscle, and beat him mercilessly with the threat of killing him for food?"

"As I was watchin' that, I was thinkin' what the hell kinda father is Vance McMadd that he raised his daughter to treat the Chojins of the IWF like animals. Which is kinda ironic, cause I was thinkin' the exact same damn thing durin' the entire Chojin Crown Tournament."

"And how do you think Kid Muscle will respond when he returns from the show and finds out about this "really exciting news" Roxanne has to tell him about?"

Meat froze, staring unblinkingly at Jacqueline, who was slowly developing a sly grin on her face as she looked back at him.

"I didn't think that was common knowledge yet…" he muttered.

"Oh but it is," Jacqueline said with a sigh. "Roxanne told me all about it. You must be very… Pleased."

"I am very pleased!" Meat snapped. "I couldn't be happier, if you must know! It's probably one of the most exciting things to ever happen for me! But it won't be the same if the kid ain't there on the big day, and that can only happen if you let him go off this stupid, badly-timed show of yours!"

Jacqueline nodded silently.

"That's all I needed to hear from you," she said softly. "I'm ready for my next guest now."

Meat slid from the chair, grumbling curses under his breath as he left. A few moments later, Trixie sat down into the chair, her arms folded over her chest, her eyes thinned to angered slits and her jaws clamped tightly together.

"Miss Trixie Maekawa!" Jacqueline greeted her. "Fiancée of one of today's most popular superhuman wrestlers, Terry Kenyon."

"I'm supposed to be getting married in six days' time," Trixie growled out between tightly clenched teeth. "If my fiancé isn't off that island before then, I will make your every waking moment a living hell."

"Wonderful!" Jacqueline said with a smile. "And how did you and Terry actually get together?"

"You already know the answer to that. I already told you. Back when I thought we were friends."

"And of course it is critical that you marry Terry as soon as possible, isn't that right?"

"Yes."

"Otherwise, things might get a little embarrassing for you both…"

"I don't want to talk about that. Especially not to you."

"Then maybe you'd like to talk about some of what we've seen happening on the island. This morning, Terry admitted that he likes to wear a sarong. Does he wear skirts when he's out with you, or is it more something he likes to do in the privacy of his own home?"

Trixie slowly thinned her eyes to dangerous blue slits before grinding out her answer through tightly clenched teeth.

"You can talk," she growled. "We all know you've got a few gender confusion issues of your own "Jack"…"

Jacqueline sighed and shook her head slightly, waves of pink hair dusting her shoulders.

"Would you like to send a message to Terry before we end this… Weak interview?"

Trixie pulled a face at Jacqueline before turning to the nearest camera and grabbing the sides of the lens in her hands.

"Terry, you listen to me," she said firmly. "Get the hell of that island and get back here! If you don't make it to our wedding, I won't ever do that thing you like me to do ever again, you hear?"

Trixie spun around and hissed at Jacqueline before marching off moodily. Jacqueline rolled her eyes before scanning around the room for her next victim. Before she finished looking, she noticed something moving towards the chair opposite her, and turned to find a forlorn Kiki dragging herself into the seat.

"Kiki Nonaka!" Jacqueline brightened, flinging her arms into the air as Kiki slouched back in her seat.

Jacqueline felt her lip curl involuntarily as she ran her eyes over Kiki, who was dressed in baggy grey sweatpants and an over-sized black fleece sweatshirt. Her hair was lank and plastered against her head, and as she was sitting slouched with her hands stuffed into her pockets, she looked more like a teenage boy than the girly fangirl who had managed to capture Mars's heart.

"So, Kiki," Jacqueline began, trying to hide her disgust. "You won the hearts of the fans for your involvement in the Bad Blood Tournament, and you–"

"What?" Kiki gasped, glaring at Jacqueline incredulously.

"The fans really warmed to you after your performance at the Bad Blood Tournament–"

"My performance? My involvement? Jacqueline, you were there with us, how could you forget? It wasn't a show it was real! We were abducted and held prisoner by a band of evil DMP monsters!"

"Quite… Moving on, why don't we start with the question on every fans' lips: what does a girl have to do to get a date with Mars?"

Kiki's face dropped but Jacqueline continued to smile radiantly at her as she awaited a response.

"I'm not playing your game any more," Kiki said darkly. "I refuse. Just let me send my message to Mars, and then let's end this pointless charade. I thought I knew you. I thought I could trust you. I thought we were really close. But I was wrong. You are an evil, twisted, manipulative creature, and I can't even look at you any more."

Kiki leapt from her chair and approached a camera, tears forming in her eyes as she tried to speak.

"Mars, this dumb show happened at a really bad time for us all, and I know things weren't ideal before you left, but I do miss you, I do love you and I do want you home. So please, do everything you can to stop this madness and come back to me."

Jacqueline turned to the group of people she still had to interview, a shiver of dread passing over her as she saw a sea of animalistic faces glaring back at her. Her next interviewee was to be Sally the gazelle, followed by Mrs Tusket and Dorothy the walruses and finally Amy; who was, technically, human, but who looked like a rabid fiend as she waited for her chance to pounce on Jacqueline again.

"Next guest," she groaned, beckoning Dik Dik's wife to join her on set.

* * *

"What is that on there?" Dik Dik asked, tilting his head as he studied Mars's T-shirt.

"It's a hot-dog," Mars flatly replied.

"It's a Kid Muscle doll," Kevin pointed out, reaching a finger towards the image in question. "See, it has two arms and two legs and a fin on the head–"

"Geddout of it!" Mars snapped, shoving his hand away.

"At least Kid only drew you holding a Kid Muscle doll," Wally sighed. "Look what he drew on my T-shirt."

The others turned to Wally, a chorus of groans echoing around the island at what they saw.

"Ain't that bestiality?" Terry asked.

"Wally is a walrus!" Kid pointed out as he rejoined the group wearing his own, newly completed T-shirt.

"Dat ain't what you look like," Mars said, pointing at the apparent self-portrait on Kid's T-shirt.

"I don't zhink Kid sees people ze same vay ve do," Jaeger said, tugging at the hem of his T-shirt and eying it in confusion.

"Why did you draw me making acts of fornication on a seal, Kid?" Wally wailed.

"Acts of fornication?" Kid yelped. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Wally slapped at his chest to indicate his point, at which Kid shook his head.

"That's not an act of fornication," Kid sighed, rolling his eyes. "That's a picture of you getting lucky with a mermaid!"

"Dat's meant to be a mermaid?" Mars muttered.

"He drew me with a fluffy tail, four legs, a snout, antlers and a saddle," Dik Dik offered.

"It's your new gimmick, dude!" Kid told him. "You're the new Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer!"

"Why did ya draw me with a big ol' moustache, smokin' a cigar and drinkin' cheap liquor?" Terry asked Kid.

"Because you're a cowboy!" Kid replied.

"Vhy do I have pig-tails and a dress?" Jaeger asked.

"Because you like to kiss boys," Kid replied.

"Why do I got a Kinnikuman T-shirt on and an ugly doll in my hand?" Mars asked.

"Because you're my biggest fan."

"Why am I singing in a shower?" Kevin asked.

"Because you live a double life as Nick Hasler."

"Why am I in the form of a lowly pawn?" Checkmate asked.

"Because you're my pawn."

"Dis is why I said we gotta kill him," Mars told the others. "We gotta do it now, and stop all dis shit before we end up killin' each other."

"No more fighting!" Kevin barked, leaping to his feet. "We'll just ask the rocks for something to do!"

"No need, look!" Terry said, pointing over Kevin's head.

The others turned to see the green sphere carrying Mac Metaphor and Doc Nakano sinking down towards the island.

"I wonder what delights they have for us this time?" Dik Dik groaned.

"Tonight, fight fans, is vote night!" Mac announced as the pod opened to bring them face-to-face with the stranded Chojins. "Tonight each Chojin must nominate one person to leave the island, and tonight we will announce the two Chojins with the most votes!"

"That's right Mac," Doc said as Mac handed a pile of envelopes to Kevin Mask. "And at mid-night, the phone lines will open so that our viewers can nominate which of the two Chojins they would most like to see leave the island."

"Vote for me!" Terry yelled up at the nearest camera. "Please!"

"But first, fight fans, we have a little surprise for our heroes!" Mac continued.

"That's right Mac, we have special video messages from their loved ones!"

"You got what?" Terry yelped, pouncing at the sphere.

"The first message is for Kid Muscle!" Mac said.

"Yay, that's me!" Kid cried, running towards the sphere.

"Hey, screw dat shit, gimme mine first!" Mars snapped, shoving Kid aside and stepping up to the sphere.

Mac and Doc stared at him with wide frightened eyes, slowly shaking their heads.

"We-we can't, buddy," Mac whispered to him.

"We just got a link to a tape from HQ," Doc added.

"We can't control what order it plays in," Mac continued. "And the first person on there is Roxanne Kinniku, with a message for Kid."

Mars barked out a few curses, wading into the water and kicking up seaweed around himself.

"Can we… Can we keep the tape?" Kevin asked awkwardly. "I mean… We don't have to watch it right here right now, do we?"

Doc and Mac nodded in unison.

"My message might contain… Sensitive information…" Kevin whispered.

"Mine too," Kid hissed, sidling up to Kevin. "I always tell Roxanne when I'm not gonna be there for a few nights, she ought to just pleasure herself, and make a video of it for me to watch when I get back."

"You disgust me on so many levels," Kevin said to him.

"All we can do is activate the link, and the video will play on this screen," Mac explained, pointing at the large screen mounted behind himself. "I'm sorry."

"Just play the video!" Terry insisted. "We all wanna see and hear our loved ones! They ain't gonna say anything rude or nasty when they know it's gonna be played on live television, right?"

"Right," Dik Dik agreed. "Roll the tape!"

All eight Chojins hurriedly gathered around the sphere as a video began to play on the screen behind the commentators, which, not surprisingly, began with Jacqueline McMadd.

"I know it was a little cruel of me to send you boys away from home so suddenly," she said, pouting at the camera sweetly. "But to make up for it, I allowed your loved ones the opportunity to record their feelings for you, so that you wouldn't feel so sad about the whole thing. The first message is from Roxanne, for her husband Kid Muscle."

Kid leaned closer, grinning eagerly as Roxanne appeared on the screen.

"Mantaro, I've been watching the show, day and night," she said. "I've hardly slept, because I've thought a lot about us. I have some news for you: for a little over four months now I've been cheating on you with Mars and Kevin. Mantaro, I have decided that you're a sneaky, lying, cheating, dirty, despicable, nasty horror of a human being, and that fin on your head is really starting to piss me off! I hate you! I can't believe I ever thought otherwise! You're dumped!"

Kid let out a small squeaking sound, before staggering back from the sphere in disbelief.

"Dang, that was harsh!" Terry muttered. "I sure hope all the girls ain't that mad at us!"

"The next message is for Terry Kenyon!"

Terry gulped, his attention snapping back to the screen as Trixie appeared, looking irate.

"I'm supposed to be getting married in six days' time," she growled. "Terry, you listen to me, we all know you've got a few gender confusion issues, if you don't make it to our wedding, I will make your every waking moment a living hell. You won't ever do that thing you like do to again, you hear?"

"What the…?" Terry yelped.

"The next message is for Mars!"

Mars grunted as Kiki appeared, looking worse than he felt.

"I'm not playing your game any more," she said darkly. "I refuse. Let's end this pointless charade. I thought I knew you. I thought I could trust you. I thought we were really close. But I was wrong. You are an evil, twisted, manipulative DMP monster, and I can't even look at you any more."

Mars grabbed a hand to his chest, his face contorting in disbelief, as though Kiki had just literally torn out his heart.

"The next message is for Dik Dik Van Dik!"

"Dik Dik, I may well now be pregnant, but it's not yours," Sally announced. "I had to see Mantaro one last time, and somehow this is what becomes of us. I think we should end it now, it we be for the best."

Dik Dik spun around, fixing his eyes onto Kid, who was too preoccupied wallowing in his own self-pity to notice the gazelleman's ire.

"The next message is for Wally Tusket and Checkmate!"

Wally and Checkmate exchanged looks of confusion before concentrating on the image of Wally's mother and sister.

"I can't believe what that boy has done!" Mrs Tusket roared, shaking a fist at the screen. "And now my poor little Dorothy is with child!"

"What?" Wally yelped.

"At first, it was just Mister Mantaro," Dorothy sobbed. "But then it was also Mister Checkmate."

"He will take responsibility for this Wally, I'll make sure of it if you don't!" Mrs Tusket added.

"Did you sleep with my sister?" Wally snapped at Checkmate.

Checkmate took a few steps back from him, muttering out a few indecipherable syllables.

"You slept with the walrus girl?" Kevin asked, his disgust evident.

"I'll kill you!" Wally snarled.

Wally and Checkmate dashed off, leaving only Kevin and Jaeger by the pod.

"The next message is for Kevin Mask!"

Kevin glanced at Jaeger, feeling silently glad that he was to be the only one present. He really did not want to face more teasing by the others over his relationship with Amy.

"Kevin you're a dick," Amy said as she appeared.

Kevin yelped indignantly, but Amy's message was far from over.

"The only thing keeping me strong right now, is the idea that soon I will be able to remodel your face with a carving knife," she said, her tone devoid of emotion and eerily menacingly. "You're pretty little face is over-rated: your father is better looking than you. Actually, even your brother is better looking than you. Also, your brother has more class and dignity than you. I despise you and everything you stand for. You're not nearly as clever as you think you are. If I never see you again, it will be too soon!"

Kevin stood staring at the screen, momentarily forgetting to breathe as he tried to comprehend what he had just heard.

"There are no messages for Jaeger, because nobody actually likes him," Jacqueline said tightly. "We just keep him around to make the others look better."

"I got off lightly!" Jaeger said cheerfully.

"And now, let the voting begin!" Jacqueline continued. "You have one hour to vote before Doc and Mac will return to collect your envelopes and announce the results!"

Doc and Mac shrugged and offered sympathetic looks as the screen went blank and their pod began ascending into the skies again.

"I can't believe you put your hands on my little sister!" Wally roared.

"You hath misunderstood!" Checkmate tried.

"Misunderstood?" Wally echoed. "Misunderstood? What is there to misunderstand? You slept with my fifteen year old sister, and now she's pregnant!"

"Hey!" Kid said suddenly, leaping to his feet. "What about you bastards, Kevin and Mars? You slept with my Roxanne!"

"It wasn't like that, it was just a one-time thing!" Kevin and Mars answered in unison.

They both turned to each other and screwed up their faces in disbelief.

"What?" they asked each other.

"Hey, I'ma good-lookin' guy!" Mars defended himself.

"When the hell did you find time to do anything with Roxanne?" Kevin demanded.

"It was just a kiss!" Mars growled. "We was both drunk, it was right before we got Kiki back from Eddie, I was lonely, we was both drunk, she was lookin' kinda hot, she was mad wid pig-boy for singin' too much karaoke, we was both drunk, and we just had a little kiss, it was no big deal, cause we was both drunk!"

"You're very defensive, are you sure it was just a kiss?" Kevin demanded.

"What's it to you?" Mars asked. "She ain't your girl! And besides, you said you had a go on her too!"

"I did not "have a go on her"!" Kevin snapped. "We just shared a little fumble after we freed her from those six idiots before the Chojin Crown!"

"What the hell does that mean?" Kid wailed.

"Knowin' Kevin, it probably means they done had hot, passionate, jungle sex," Terry said flatly.

"No sex!" Kevin snapped. "Just a little… Fumble."

"You stole the Chojin Crown and my girl!" Kid yelled.

"I never stole anything!" Kevin argued back. "It happened after we fought those idiots who kidnapped the girls!"

"The Bad Blood Tournament?" Kid echoed. "Mars put his tongue in wife's throat and you put your fingers in her cushion at the same time?"

"No!" Kevin cried. "The Poison Six Pack! She came after me to thank me for helping her, and, being the gentleman that I am, I…"

"Put your hand in da cookie jar," Mars finished for him.

"You stay out of this!" Kevin warned him.

"You defiled my sweet, innocent Roxanne!" Kid wailed.

"It was a long time ago, she wasn't with you back then!" Kevin pointed out.

"No…" Jaeger said slowly. "She vas vith me back zen…"

Kevin slowly turned to Jaeger, who was eying him sceptically.

"She left me because she had a crush on you," Jaeger added.

"That's true," Dik Dik agreed.

"I don't get it," Terry said, scratching his head. "I always thought Kevin had a thing for Kiki."

"I never had a thing for Kiki!" Kevin hurriedly defended himself.

"You still do, ya dirty rat!" Mars growled.

"This is ridiculous!" Kevin yelped.

"You've ruined everybody's happiness Kevin Mask, you suck!" Kid said accusingly. "Maybe you're the one who got Dorothy pregnant! And Sally too, because it sure wasn't me!"

"You slept with my wife?" Dik Dik growled, rising to his feet.

"I didn't sleep with anybody!" Kevin shouted, the volume of his voice sending another flock of birds into the air.

"Yeah guys, that must be true," Wally said. "Don't you remember what Sprite told us? Kevin is a virgin."

Kevin opened his mouth to argue the point, but upon seeing that the others accepted Wally's words and calmed down, he decided to let it go.

"I'm not voting for him, just in case!" Kid said, scowling at Kevin. "I'm not sending him back so that he can "fumble" with my wife!"

Kid marched off to complete his voting card, and the others all began to disperse to their own secluded areas, until only Kevin and Mars remained. Kevin slowly turned to Mars, who he found already staring at him.

"Ain't we gonna all agree who to vote off?" he asked.

"I thought we already did," Kevin said quietly. "Kid Muscle."

"I dunno, you're causing a lotta trouble here, Kev," Mars said, shaking his head. "I might vote for you."

"Please do," Kevin instantly replied. "I want to leave the island."

"Me too," Mars agreed. "I'll vote for you if you vote for me."

"Sounds fair," Kevin replied.

* * *

"I never said that!" Roxanne wailed. "I would never say that!"

"You said all of those words," Jacqueline sighed.

"But not in that order!" Roxanne snapped. "You used my insults against you to sound like I meant them against Mantaro!"

"Shouldn't you be staying calm?" Jacqueline asked sweetly. "In your condition?"

Roxanne gasped, watching with wide eyes of disbelief as Jacqueline sauntered up to a camera. Trixie started to go after her, but the girls were held back by security staff as the cameras around Jacqueline came to life and she began her live broadcast of the results of the vote.

"Welcome back to _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_," she said, grinning flawlessly. "The votes from the island are in, they have been counted, and we have a tie!"

"Great, that probably means nobody gets to go home!" Kiki muttered to the others.

"We received four votes for Kid Muscle," Jacqueline continued. "One vote for Wally Tusket, one vote for Checkmate and one vote for Kevin Mask. We can only have two candidates for the public vote, so I am going to choose two of the four nominees only for the vote! First of all, I am removing Kevin Mask from the list because he is the team captain, and every team needs its captain. Secondly, I am removing Kid Muscle. I know he received the most votes, but he is also the weakest member of the team, and it's important that the team is a well-rounded one, with both strong and weak members. So who will be voted off the island tomorrow night: Wally Tusket or Checkmate? You, the fans, can decide by calling this number, and pressing one to vote for Wally, or two to vote for Checkmate. Lines open at mid-night, and they close at 8pm tomorrow. Until then, happy voting!"

* * *

"You didn't vote for me," Mars said, glowering at Kevin.

"You didn't vote for me either, birdbrain," Kevin flatly replied.

"Dere was a vote for you, but dere wasn't no vote for me!" Mars argued.

"Kid Muscle voted for me," Kevin pointed out.

"You don't know dat! Remember, he said he didn't trust you back home wid his wife."

"Yes actually, I do."

"How?"

Kevin pointed over Mars's shoulder, and Mars turned accordingly, watching as Kid put his T-shirt on backwards, revealing that he had written "VOTE NO TO SHOUBEN MASK" on the back of it.

"Yeah, I voted for Kid Muscle too," Mars said, quirking an eyebrow at Kevin.

"Unfortunately neither of us got what we wanted," Kevin sighed.

"Yeah, too bad we gotta lose Wally or Checkers, dey was pretty useful."

"I guess we should get some sleep and just see what tomorrow brings."

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The result of the vote is in, and the first of the eight contenders leaves the island. The remaining seven Chojins receive their latest task, which turns out to be even more impossible than the first. Kevin gets humiliated further when a hidden camera broadcasts Roxanne's retelling of their brief encounter, and back at HQ, the girls learn something about one of the stranded Chojins. **Chapter 7 – Checkmate**.


	7. Checkmate

**Recap:** Jacqueline sent fake messages to the contestants on the island that made it seem as though their loved ones hated them, creating tension on the island and back at the studio. The contestants voted to evict a member of their group, and Jacqueline decided the two candidates for eviction would be Checkmate and Wally Tusket.

* * *

**Chapter 7 – Checkmate**

"Oh for fuck's sake!" Kevin groaned, dragging himself up and clawing at the rock that had just clanged against his mask, awakening him from what had been an almost restful sleep.

"What does it say?" Dik Dik asked, hurrying over to join him.

"Kevin Mask, the next task is the "80 times around the world" task," Kevin read aloud. "Tomorrow morning you will be provided with a running machine that will record the distance each participant runs. You will have until sundown to record a total distance of 3.2 million kilometres. The distance must be recorded by members of the group running on the machine, and any cheating will result in a disqualification for the whole team, and you will not be given your prize. The prize for successfully completing the task will be a small selection of basic toiletries for each member of the group. Good luck in your task!"

Kevin lifted his head, finding seven faces looking back at him with as much dismay and disgust as he felt brewing in the pit of his stomach.

"Lucky for us we still have Kenyon and Jaeger," he concluded. "You're both good runners, and the rest of us can easily manage to do well on this task."

"I hope Wally gets voted off," Kid whispered loudly to Kevin. "He's fat and kinda slow, but Checkmate can use his knight-form and run really far for us!"

Kevin waited for Kid to realise that everyone else had clearly heard him, but he remained oblivious, winking at Kevin and nodding his head knowingly.

"Idiot," Kevin grumbled.

* * *

Roxanne sat perfectly still, her eyebrows arched high on her forehead, her eyes like saucers and her mouth forming a small O-shape. Kiki's shoulders were heaving with every breath and every failed attempt at words she made, her head twisted to one side, her eyebrows pushed together and her fingers dancing in the air in front of her. Between them, Trixie sat snorting and giggling into one hand, the other hand slapping against her thigh, her entire body shaking with the force of her restrained laughter.

"Ch-Ch-Checkmate…" Kiki eventually managed. "A-And… D-D-D-Dorothy?"

Trixie snorted a little louder and Roxanne's eyebrows twitched further up her brow.

"Who'd have thought it?" Jacqueline said with a sigh, flicking her hair from one eye with her fingertips. "That hunk banging the little elephant girl."

"She's a walrus," Roxanne corrected her.

"And he's a piece of chess…" Kiki whispered, her head moving to tilt in the opposite direction.

"You're making babies with a bird, what's your point?" Jacqueline asked her.

"Hey!" Kiki yelped indignantly, standing abruptly and rounding Jacqueline. "You leave Mars out of this, you nasty witch!"

"I'm just telling the truth," Jacqueline replied with a shrug. "You're with a bird, Roxanne is with a pig and Trixie may be with a real man, but he has the intelligence and grace of a two year old."

"Hey!" Trixie snapped, turning to Jacqueline. "Terry's the smartest guy in the Muscle League!"

"You sure about that?" Roxanne asked quietly.

"He's smarter than Kid Muscle!" Trixie argued.

"Trixie, don't yell at Roxanne, that's exactly what Jacqueline wants us to do!" Kiki implored. "That way she can make another video of us and edit it badly so that we sound horrid and mean!"

"The camera never lies," Jacqueline said, before walking off and leaving the girls cursing her name.

She headed in the direction of her personal dressing room, irked to find her brother loitering in the corridor that led there, looking particularly smug about something.

"Face it, you're losing," Jacqueline snapped at him as she neared him. "I'm stealing the chair out from under you, and there's nothing you can do about it!"

"You're very confident," Ikeman casually replied. "Your little show has only been on the air a few days."

"And already it's more successful than any crap that you've ever done."

Jacqueline shoved open the door to her room, hesitating to enter as she heard her brother chuckle behind her back.

"Something funny?" she sneered, leering over her shoulder at him. "Or has the taste of failure made you go insane?"

"Time will tell," Ikeman replied.

Jacqueline turned to face him, but he had already turned his back on her and begun walking off. She watched him go, silently wondering if he was plotting something. As he drew level with the three girls he stopped and nodded, smiling to himself. Jacqueline frowned, turning her attention to the girls, who appeared to be suddenly arguing amongst themselves about something.

"Don't even go there, Roxanne!" Kiki yelled, stamping a foot angrily. "I saw what the boys were talking about last night: you kissed my boyfriend! You were just married, we'd been talking about how much we loved our boyfriends, and you kissed mine behind my back!"

"I didn't kiss Mars!" Roxanne argued back.

"Oh so Mars is a liar now?" Kiki asked her.

"Well, he's never been able to make up his mind about which side he's on…" Trixie muttered as she admired her fingernails.

"Stay out of this, Trixie!" Roxanne and Kiki both yelled at her.

Trixie held up her hands in submission, and the others turned on each other again.

"So what did happen?" Kiki demanded.

Roxanne sighed, slouching her shoulders in defeat.

"Okay, I'm sorry, we did kiss," she confessed. "I was at a bar with my mom, Kid and Suguru, and I saw Mars in his… Hawkeye outfit, and I told him he looked hot. We were both drunk, he said I looked hot too, we hugged, and as we let go, we sorta… Had a little kiss…"

Trixie made a small, high-pitched humming noise at the back of her throat, but one warning glare from Roxanne stopped her from speaking her opinion on the matter.

"I'm really, really sorry Kiki," Roxanne said. "Really I am. Please forgive me?"

"How can I forgive you?" Kiki snapped. "That's a horrible thing to do to your friend!"

"Mars did it too," Roxanne said meekly.

"I'm angry at him too!"

"Look, if it makes you feel any better, you can kiss Mantaro."

Trixie burst out laughing, slapping Roxanne's shoulder.

"Good one, Rox!" she giggled.

"Okay, what can I do to make it up to you, Kiki?" Roxanne tried again.

Kiki rolled her eyes to the ceiling, looking thoughtful for a moment before a dark smile crept onto her face and her eyes found Roxanne's once more. Roxanne gulped nervously and attempted a smile.

"You'll do anything?" Kiki asked sweetly.

"Anything," Roxanne said, feeling far less confident than she sounded.

"Alright then," Kiki said, clapping her hands together and grinning brightly. "Tell me and Trixie exactly what it was like "fumbling" with Kevin Mask…"

Roxanne's face turned white, then red and then white with streaks of pink.

"That good, huh?" Trixie asked her. "Now you absolutely have to tell us all the details – and why did you never tell us this before?"

Roxanne grinned sheepishly.

"It was kinda embarrassing…" she said, avoiding their eager eyes. "I just wanted to thank him for helping us out, but when I saw him… He looked really good, and I couldn't stop myself…"

* * *

"But the funniest part is, he asked me where he should put it!"

"Oh my God!"

"You're making this up!"

"I wish I was! He put his other hand down the back of my pants, and when his fingers brushed against me, I flinched, and he asked me if he'd just touched my c–"

"HEY!"

Kevin ran from the other seven Chojins until he was knee-deep in the ocean, at which point he stopped and flung the remote far out to sea.

"What a dork!" he heard Kid Muscle snigger behind him.

"Where did ya put your finger, "big boy"?" Terry called to him.

Kevin turned back, finding his fellow Muscle Leaguers and the IWF commentators laughing shamelessly at him even though he had managed to stop the tape Mac had insisted on playing to them before it got to the really embarrassing part.

"Hey guys, c'mon, let's give da guy a break, huh?"

Kevin paused by the shore, screwing up his face in disbelief at Mars; who of course could not see his expression through his mask, and yet, as usual, somehow managed to sense it.

"I'm just lookin' out for da group," Mars explained to him. "Cause ain't nobody here wants to "da big boy doin' it rough and strong" on dem."

Kevin growled in frustration as the others burst out laughing again, and Mars began slapping his shoulder as though he ought to appreciate the joke.

"The video's back on!" Mac called out.

Kevin cringed as he heard Roxanne continue her story about their little encounter in the wooded area behind a small biker's bar he had been trying to relax after fighting the Poison Six Pack, when she had – literally – pounced on him and begun grinding her hips against him, resulting in his hands and mouth disobeying his better senses by doing and saying things that were completely absurd, even by Kid Muscle's standards. His only consolation was that in a few hours' time, one of the other idiots he was trapped on the island with would be gone. And maybe, he thought to himself, he could find a way to sneak off the island with the loser and return home to the comforts of the Mask Estate at last.

* * *

"Oh I hope my little Blubber-Boo gets home!" Mrs Tusket whined. "He must be so worried about his baby sister after that vicious woman made it sound like I had said all those horrible things about her!"

"Horrible?" Kiki echoed, feeling a little alarmed that Mrs Tusket would use such a word to describe her own daughter's pregnancy.

"She made it sound like I was telling Wally about Dorothy being pregnant!" Mrs Tusket replied. "And then that Checkmate admitted to messing with my little girl…"

Kiki leaned back, her eyes doubling in size as Mrs Tusket pulled a giant salmon from somewhere in the bosom of her sweater. Deciding that the old walrus was on the warpath again, Kiki turned to Dorothy, who was skipping abut nervously.

"Say Dorothy, you are pregnant, right?" she asked her.

"What?" Dorothy echoed.

"Of course she is," Sally said over the top of her magazine. "Just like the rest of you lucky girls. Do you all have any idea how long I've been trying for a baby of my own?"

"You're not pregnant Sally?" Trixie asked, sitting forwards suddenly.

"No, of course not!" Sally replied, lowering her magazine to her lap. "Who said that I was?"

"I thought everyone here was, and it was some sort of a weird coincidence," Roxanne said slowly, looking around the others.

"I'm not pregnant!" Dorothy wailed. "Mister Checkmate was always a gentleman with me!"

"Oh shit…" Trixie muttered.

"Oh I'm sorry Dorothy!" Kiki said gently. "We thought you were!"

"And we thought you were too, Sally," Trixie added. "Sorry that you're not, I know you and Dik Dik were trying."

Sally shrugged.

"But the rest of you are, right?" she asked. "You, Roxanne, Kiki and Jacqueline, right?"

"What's going on in here?" Jacqueline demanded, shoving her way to the centre of the room.

"Nothing," Sally said with a sigh, lifting up her magazine to block her view of Jacqueline.

"We're just waiting for the results of the vote," Kiki explained, pointing at the large screen mounted on the back wall of the room, where a live countdown showed there were only a few seconds left for voters to register their choice.

"Shouldn't you be out there to read the result?" Roxanne asked Jacqueline.

"I'm letting my father do it," she carefully replied, folding her arms across her chest as she looked around the others gathered in the room.

"Such an interesting little dilemma, isn't it?" Ikeman sang, skipping into the room behind Jacqueline and almost sending her flying as she leapt in shock.

"I told you not to creep up on me with that face!" she snapped at her brother.

"I just had to see your reaction to the news!" Ikeman replied, batting his eyelids at her in a way that made everyone in the room cringe.

"And the lines are now closed!" Vance McMadd's voice announced from the television. "The lines are closed! No more calls please, the lines are closed, and no more votes can be registered. The vote is now being tallied, and we expect to have the result momentarily!"

"Isn't it exciting?" Ikeman asked Jacqueline.

"Not that exciting…" Jacqueline muttered, eying Ikeman over disdainfully.

"Wait, I'm confused…" Sally said suddenly, slapping her magazine down against her legs. "If you all thought Dorothy and I were pregnant, does that still mean that you all are too, are did we get that wrong too?"

"Is anyone in this room pregnant?" Dorothy asked.

"And the result is now in!" Vance called out.

Ikeman grinned as the girls all looked around each other, shaking their heads in the negative.

"The result is in!" Vance continued. "The Chojin with the highest number of votes, who will be leaving the island tonight is…"

"I guess only one of us is then. And it's me."

Sally and Dorothy gasped as they spotted one woman standing with one hand in the air and the other resting on her stomach.

"Checkmate!" Vance announced.

"Checkmate indeed, sister," Ikeman whispered into Jacqueline's ear.

"This doesn't change a thing!" she hissed, rounding on him. "Not a single thing! I can still use this to my advantage to get more fans interested, to sell more merchandise and to take the chair from you!"

"Are you really sure you want to exploit him that way?"

Ikeman pointed at the screen and Jacqueline turned to find a shot of the soon-to-be-father. She sighed in annoyance and turned back to her brother.

"He's an idiot," she said simply. "And he's my puppet. I got what I wanted out of him at the Chojin Crown, I can do it all over again right here, right now!"

The siblings glared at each other silently for a moment before both charged at the doorway, bashing into each other unceremoniously as they both tried to leave the room at the same time.

"Get out of my way, oaf!" Jacqueline snapped, shoving her way ahead.

"You can run, but you can't hide!" Ikeman yelled after her as he left the room. "You're going down!"

"Wow, talk about dysfunctional families…" Trixie snorted.

She turned on her heel to find everyone still staring at the bedraggled and frightened looking figure in the centre of the room.

"And just as one goes, another one begins…" she muttered to herself. "We talked about it, but I never thought those two would ever be parents…"

* * *

Kevin dodged suddenly to one side, causing the others to eye him warily.

"Ha!" he declared, pointing at an indentation in the sand where he had been standing moments earlier. "It missed me!"

The others grunted and nodded their understanding as Kevin bent down to retrieve a rock with a note attached.

"Kevin Mask, the vote has been decided," he read aloud. "Checkmate will be leaving the island tonight."

Wally groaned, Checkmate grinned and Kid kicked at the sand at the prospect of losing knight-form Checkmate the night before their running challenge.

"To ensure nobody tries any funny business," Kevin continued. "A helicopter will lower a rope ladder capable of carrying one man only, which Checkmate must climb to leave the island. If anybody else tries to escape, the ladder will be cut."

"That's nice," Dik Dik muttered.

"That's Jacqueline McMadd," Terry pointed out.

"You better stay away from my sister!" Wally warned, brandishing a fist at Checkmate.

Mars and Kevin quickly leapt between them to stop them from brawling over the matter again.

"So when does this helicopter get here?" Kid asked, picking at his nose.

"Now?" Jaeger offered, as the sound of an approaching helicopter began to reach their ears.

"I am but sorry that we could not all have left together," Checkmate said, looking around the others.

"They originally told us that nobody would leave the island in the first two weeks, so this is, at least, progress," Kevin pointed out.

"I'ma be da last guy here," Mars said with a sigh. "I'm too popular. Wid you guys and da fans. Ain't nobody gonna vote for me."

Kevin and Dik Dik rolled their eyes, but Mars appeared not to notice their actions. The group gathered to watch as a large helicopter arced around overhead, a rope ladder unfurling as it passed over the shoreline.

"Me and Terry together weigh less than Checkmate!" Kid suddenly yelled, running for the ladder.

He was shortly tackled to the ground by six other bodies as Checkmate made his way towards the ladder.

"If I ain't gettin' home, you ain't either!" Mars yelled at Kid.

Mars was the first to step back from the melee to watch as Checkmate began climbing the ladder and the helicopter began to move off, taking him from the island. He reasoned that he could still launch himself at the rope and potentially make an escape: but the memory of Kiki's earlier message made him start to think that maybe the island was the best place for him to be. Apparently she was even angrier than he had bargained on her being, and maybe a little more time apart would help her calm down.

Kevin stood at his side, the look on his face suggesting that he was going through similar thought processes to Mars as he squinted at Checkmate's diminishing form.

"Sometimes I'm not so sure if getting home will be any better than staying here for the next umpteen weeks," Kevin said dryly, turning to face Mars.

"I hear ya buddy," Mars agreed, nodding his head. "I ain't so sure I wanna go back to bein' nagged all day."

"Sometimes I miss the old days," Kevin said with a small sigh.

"Da DMP days?" Mars asked, smirking a little.

"Well, not exactly the DMP days as such, more just the times when I… And…"

Kevin planted his hands on his hips, tilting his head upwards in thought.

"I miss the DMP days," he concluded.

"Yeah, me too," Mars quietly agreed.

* * *

Checkmate was relieved when his feet finally found solid ground again as he entered the IWF headquarters. He had hoped to return home after leaving the island, but he had been taken to the studio Jacqueline was leading the show from to talk about his experiences on the island on the promise that he could do whatever he wanted to once Jacqueline had spoken to him. He was flanked by the crew of _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ as he walked through the seemingly endless corridors of the vast headquarters building, but despite being surrounded by large bodies and being a large man himself, upon entering the studio, Checkmate promptly felt something wet and heavy slap him over the back of the head, causing him to stumble ungraciously.

"You'll pay for putting your hands on my baby girl!"

Checkmate looked up to catch a glimpse of a rabid, red-eyed walrus before he was once more slapped about the head with an unreasonably huge fish. He squatted down and brought his arms up to deflect any further attacks, refusing to fight back against a woman.

"Momma, stop!" Dorothy pleaded, tugging at her arm.

"Hey Checkmate, are you okay?"

Checkmate smiled politely at Kiki, who had crouched down at his side and was frowning worriedly at him. She had such a kind heart, it seemed almost impossible that earlier that day she had been saying vicious things about Mars, the man she supposedly loved beyond reason.

"Hey Checkmate, how is everyone on the island?" Roxanne asked, crouching at his other side.

"That bitch Jacqueline edited our messages and made it sound like we were being really nasty!" Trixie added.

"Oh!" Checkmate gasped, rising to his feet.

Roxanne and Kiki stood at his sides, waiting anxiously for him to continue.

"We didn't say any of those things they played to you!" Sally added.

"We did say those words, but not in that order," Amy said. "And the insults you heard were words we were using against Jacqueline!"

"That's right!" Kiki agreed.

"I see," Checkmate said, nodding his head. "Twas difficult to survive a mere few days in such stifling conditions, I sincerely hope my fellow Muscle League members are not detained much longer there."

"My wedding is going to be ruined," Trixie sobbed.

"And Mantaro is gone miss the big… Well…"

Checkmate turned to Roxanne, who scratched at her head and grinned nervously.

"We have something exciting…" she tried again. "It's a sort of… Family thing… And he might miss it if he's gone a very long time. He's already missing some of the fun."

"I never even told Mars about our little family thing," Kiki sighed. "He would be so proud if only he knew…"

Checkmate slowly looked around each of the females gathered around him until he was shocked back to reality at the sight of Jacqueline McMadd, who was suddenly standing over him brandishing a microphone, with a camera at her shoulder. A pair of spotlights swung around almost blinding him as Jacqueline began to talk.

"Well Checkmate, you didn't last very long on the island, but during that time you shocked fans and the Muscle League alike by confessing to your affair with an underage teenage walrus," she said. "How does it feel to be the biggest loser of the Muscle League?"

Checkmate opened his mouth to answer her, to tell her that losing on her show had been one of the proudest achievements of his career, as he would suffer the minimum of embarrassment leaving the island so early; but Jacqueline apparently wished to conduct a one-sided interview, as she carried on talking. Checkmate turned his back on her and left her to look ridiculous on live television. He no longer cared if his response meant that he was detained at the IWF headquarters, he was at least off the island, unlike the unfortunate remainder of the Muscle League.

As he made his way around the back of the studio, Checkmate was surprised to find one of the IWF Legends loitering a little apprehensively by a buffet table. Curiosity getting the better of him, Checkmate approached the famous aging Chojin to ask why he was anywhere near the ludicrous reality television farce that was ongoing; but the answer he received was not the one he had expected.

* * *

Kid Muscle screamed, awakening everyone on the island. The sun was only just starting to appear on the horizon, but his cry had been piercing enough to awaken every animal on the island, creating an uproar of noise and movement.

"The hell was that for?" Terry asked him, rubbing sleepily at one eye.

"Kevin just punched me!" Kid wailed.

"You punched me in the gut, I was returning the favour!" Kevin spat back.

"He didn't punch ya, Kev," Mars said through a yawn. "It was another rock."

Mars picked up the latest rock to land on the island, removing the attached note. As he opened it out he immediately broke into a grin and leapt to his feet, suddenly wide awake.

"What is it?" Terry demanded.

"Are we going home?" Dik Dik asked.

"Hey, it's from Checkers!" Mars said cheerfully. "It says, uh…"

Mars scanned through the note, frowning a little as he found that the note had been tampered with. It looked as though Checkmate had hastily written a message to someone on the island, but before he could send it out, one of the McMadds had scored through some of the key words in the note with a black marker pen, completely and utterly obscuring them, leaving behind a slightly cryptic message.

But a message of clear importance regardless, and one that made Mars break into a cold sweat of panic.

"What is it?" Kid asked. "It looks scary!"

"I don't believe dis…" Mars muttered, the paper quivering a little in his hand.

"Give it here!" Kevin said sharply, snatching the note from him. "Let's see here… Ah, it looks like that McMadd woman has interfered with it. It says: Blank, you must get off the island as soon as you possibly can, have the others vote you off or else find a way to escape. It is of the utmost importance that you return before blank because that is the expected birth date of your child. Congratulations blank, you are going to be a father."

Kevin slowly lowered the note, looking around the sea of sickened faces looking back at him.

"Who's this dude called Blank?" Kid asked.

"Probably you, ya dumb-ass!" Mars yelled at him.

"Or not!" Dik Dik hurriedly said. "It must be for me! I'm the only one here who has been trying to become a father!"

Dik Dik's face slowly dropped as he saw the others avoid his eyes.

"What is it?" he asked in a low voice.

"Define "tryin' to become a father"…" Terry said slowly.

Dik Dik groaned, rolling his eyes.

"See, it could be me…" Terry added. "Trixie has been pushin' real hard to get married outta nowhere, and maybe it's cause she's already pregnant!"

"What's the expected birth date?" Dik Dik asked Kevin.

"Blank," Kevin sarcastically replied.

"Maybe it is me," Kid mused. "I mean now that I think about it, I think I can remember being Roxanne about nine months before blank..."

Mars began making incoherent noises of question at the Kinniku prince, but Kevin quickly raised a hand in front of him to stop him.

"I don't know that I'm ready to be a daddy…" Terry said quietly.

"Well I am!" Dik Dik argued.

"Ah shit, it can't be Kiki!" Mars growled, kicking a sizeable rock across the sand. "It ain't right, not like dis!"

"I wonder if my son will be bigger than Meat when he is born…" Kid pondered.

"Shut your mouth, or I'ma shut it for you," Mars warned him. "Permanently."

Kevin snorted and the others turned to him curiously.

"This is the price you idiots pay for investing all your time playing about with girls instead of focussing your energy on more productive matters," he said flatly.

"Vot if it's Jacqueline?" Jaeger suddenly burst out.

"Dat ain't possible," Mars immediately replied. "Cause if she's pregnant, dere ain't no way in hell she knows who da daddy is."

"Yeah, Jacqueline will totally take us all on the Maury show!" Kid said.

"Idiot!" Kevin growled at him.

"Well I know that note isn't for me," Wally said sadly.

"And so do I," Kevin agreed, slapping the note against Mars's chest. "I'm not a hopeless idiot like you lot are. I suggest you all forget about this for now, the treadmill will be here soon, and we have an immense task ahead of us today."

"I can't do dis…" Mars muttered as he looked down at the note again.

"Ain't there some kinda way we could see what the blanks say?" Terry asked, taking the note from him and holding it against the rising sun in an attempt to see the words that had been obscured.

"It's for me," Kid said, taking the note from Terry. "You can tell it's for me because the note starts with Blank, and that's Checkmate's nickname for me."

"Your nickname is not blank!" Jaeger snapped, grabbing the note from Kid. "Zhis note could just as easily be for me!"

"Do you want it to be for you?" Dik Dik asked him.

"Of course not!" Jaeger yelped.

"Then give it here," Dik Dik said, taking the note for himself. "It's obviously meant for me, after all."

"And what if it's from Kiki, huh?" Mars asked, snatching back the note. "Dis would explain everythin' about her weird behaviour lately! I know she's been up to somethin' behind my back, she said somethin' about making our family complete, dis must be what she meant!"

"I'm the one bein' forced up the aisle!" Terry yelled, grabbing the note. "This is for me! I've been careless lately, a few spontaneous acts o' passion, and now this! Trixie is a traditional kinda girl at heart, she always said she wouldn't have kids unless she was already married!"

"Dude, I'm the only married one here, and I've been with my girl longer than anyone else here has been with their girls," Kid said flatly, taking the note.

"I was intimate wid Kiki before you ever got past holdin' hands wid Roxanne!" Mars pointed out, taking the note.

"I vas completely careless during my affair vith Jack!" Jaeger argued, taking the note. "Zhis is vhy she has done zhis whole show, she is mad at me for abandoning her!"

"This note is for me!" Dik Dik said, taking the note.

"It's for me, I tell ya!" Terry said, taking the note.

"Nuh-uh!" Kid said, snatching the note.

"It's mine!" Mars said, taking the note.

"Mine!" Dik Dik said, taking the note.

"Nein!" Jaeger said, taking the note.

All five continued to grab at Checkmate's note and yell at each other until they had successfully torn it to indiscernible shreds, at which point they then began to argue that Kevin had not read the note properly and that they were all missing the true message.

"Idiots," Kevin said with a sigh, sitting down next to Wally on a large rock.

"I don't know," Wally said with a forlorn sigh. "It sure would be nice to be worried over whether or not the woman I was in love with was carrying my baby."

"Pff!" Kevin snorted.

"Say Kevin, how do you know that the note isn't for you?"

Kevin slowly turned to fully face Wally, glaring at him with glowing yellow eyes through the shadows of his mask.

"You have a girlfriend, right?" Wally asked.

"Yes, but I am not an idiot," Kevin simply replied. "I wouldn't dream of bringing a child into this life, least of all into families like ours. My family are a disgrace, and her family are even worse. We already agreed that we would both make terrible parents, so there's no chance in hell that Amy has done something as stupid as get herself pregnant."

Wally slowly nodded, although inwardly he could not help but think that Kevin was a bit of a bastard.

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The running task begins, but the seven remaining contestants struggle to complete it as a lack of food and the stress of Checkmate's message start to take their toll. Back at the studio, the girls react badly to some of what they see and hear from the island, and Meat schemes to sabotage the show. **Chapter 8 – Maybe Baby.**


	8. Maybe Baby

**Recap:** Checkmate left the island, but when he got back, he found out that one of the remaining contestants will soon be a father. He tried to send a note to the man in question, but it was intercepted and the message left the seven Chojins on the island at war with themselves and each other.

* * *

**Chapter 8 – Maybe Baby**

Meat paused, frowning at the sight before him. Marie was standing watching something beyond his line of sight, her face creased with worry, one hand clutched to her chest, looking as though she was on the point of tears.

"Marie?" he asked softly.

She glanced at him, the look on her face doing little to reassure his mounting concern. She silently beckoned him to join her and he immediately did so, his eyes following her finger as she pointed it in the direction of a lone figure sat in front of a large television set. Meat tilted his head curiously, wondering what Marie had been so concerned about; but as he watched, highlights of the previous day's events on _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ began to play, including a particular Chojin expressing his opinion on potentially being a father. Meat began to frown in concern himself, and he was relieved when Sally leapt at the television and switched it off.

The lone figure in front of the now blackened screen stood, turning to Sally as she slowly moved away from the television.

"Don't pay any attention to how they've edited that show!" Sally pleaded.

Meat lowered his eyes a little, tensing as he saw for the first time that the woman who had been watching the show was – when seen in profile – gaining a slight roundness to her stomach.

"This is ridiculous!" Meat growled quietly, so as not to attract their attention.

"I know, isn't it awful?" Marie whispered back. "I feel as though we should do something, but what?"

Meat rubbed at his chin thoughtfully, various images and sounds passing through his mind.

"I might just have a plan," he concluded. "But it will mean everybody here has gotta work together."

* * *

Six Chojins stood staring with large round eyes of disbelief. The sun was high in the sky meaning that it was easily mid-day, and – by Terry's calculations made just minutes earlier – it had been some five hours since the running machine had arrived. The group had been a little taken aback when one Chojin not exactly known for working hard had volunteered to begin the task, but after over five hours of watching him sprint at an inhumanly fast pace without losing any of the determination burning in his eyes, they were nothing short of shocked.

"What the hell is this?" Dik Dik asked.

"Yeah, what the hell?" Terry asked.

"I can't believe he's maintained that speed all this time!" Wally added.

"He vill kill himself, he never even warmed up before he began!" Jaeger pointed out.

"Will you guys relax?" Kid scoffed, picking at his nose and admiring his findings. "The longer and further he runs, the less the rest of us have to do."

"He's been round the world thirty times already," Dik Dik said flatly.

"Heck, he's nearly as fast as I am!" Terry gasped. "And I don't reckon I could keep that kinda speed up for this long and in this here heat!"

"His stamina is incredible!" Wally agreed.

"He vill make himself sick, he von't even take a drink, he vill dehydrate!"

Kevin blurted out a noise of disgust and surprise as he suddenly found five pairs of eyes glaring at him.

"You have to stop him, Kevin," Dik Dik told him.

"If Mars wants to complete this task on his own, I say let him do it," Kevin casually replied. "If he wants to wear himself out that's fine by me. It will keep him out of mischief. And we have nothing to lose if we fail this task. Mars is only doing this because he needs a bag of cosmetics, anyway…"

"He's doin' this because he's panickin' about Kiki bein' pregnant!" Terry argued.

"Does he know that Kiki is pregnant?" Kevin asked.

"No, but–"

"Then he shouldn't be panicking, should he?"

"I think you should at least talk to him, Kevin," Wally tried. "He won't take water from us, you have to try to get him to at least take a drink before he collapses!"

"Does that look like a man about to collapse to you?"

The others turned to the running machine, which Mars was still battering out kilometres on at a terrifying rate. He was wearing nothing but a pair of shorts and his headdress, his Mask of Madness pulled down, a move he had used half an hour into the task to increase his speed. He was sweating and glowing, steam rising off of him under the intense heat of the tropical island sun and he almost sounded as though he was growling as he ran.

"He's run through his own skin, Kevin," Dik Dik said dryly, his ears flattening against his head in what he hoped was a condescending expression.

Kid Muscle screamed as he sighted the sprays of blood on the sand behind the running machine. Kevin tried to contain his own surprise at the sight, carefully edging a little closer to the red stains, squinting at Mars to confirm their source. He quickly realised that Mars was running in his bare feet and that he did appear to have worn the skin off of the soles of his feet; and judging by the darkness of the blood behind him, he had begun removing skin at least an hour earlier.

"Who wants to go next?" Kevin asked with a sigh, looking around the others.

Jaeger and Terry both stepped forwards, eying each other a little competitively as each noticed that he had not been the only volunteer.

"You'll all get a turn, don't worry," Kevin assured them. "Kenyon, you had better go next. Jaeger I might need you to help me calm old scarface down…"

Jaeger nodded, and he and Terry followed after Kevin as he approached the machine.

"Mars?" Kevin said as he stopped by Mars's side.

Mars completely ignored Kevin's presence at his side, which made Kevin roll his eyes; an action of course that was all but invisible behind his mask.

"Mars!" he barked.

Still Mars ignored him, losing none of his momentum.

"Mars, you bloody idiot!" Kevin yelled, grabbing Mars's arm.

In a blur of yellow and blue Mars leapt off the machine and collided with Kevin, sending them both tumbling into the surf, where they rolled over until a wave washed over them, forcing them both to separate and begin treading water to stay afloat.

"Don't stop, we don't have time!" Kevin yelled at Terry as he hesitated by the running machine, watching Mars and Kevin with interest.

Terry turned to Jaeger, who shrugged his shoulders. Terry leapt onto the machine and began running, at which Kevin turned back to Mars.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Kevin demanded.

Mars snarled out a feral, guttural sound of displeasure before diving at Kevin and forcing them both under water. Kevin immediately tried to drag them both to the surface again, knowing that an exhausted body and one in an iron mask would be no use in the ocean, but Mars was holding him down with unexpected strength after his prolonged running stunt. Kevin reluctantly kicked Mars in the thigh, which loosened his grip enough for Kevin to escape and surface. He hurriedly swam towards a rocky outcrop from one end of the beach, barely reaching the edge of the rocks as Mars caught him again.

Kevin left out a groan, which dissolved into bubbles around him as Mars's weight forced him under the surface of the water again. He struggled and thrashed against Mars, who appeared to only really be interested in drowning him. He eventually managed to get hold of the spike of Mars's headdress, pulling them both sharply out of the water before smashing Mars's head against the rocks. Kevin then quickly scrambled out of the water, stumbling ungraciously to his feet and turning to watch as Mars hooked an arm over a rock, slowly lifting his head, his yellow mask streaked with blood.

Kevin started towards him to offer him help out of the water, but Mars hoisted himself up with unnatural ease, slowly walking up to Kevin, his chest heaving, the water diluting his blood and pooling it down the sinews of his neck and chest.

"I ain't satisfied yet," he ground out, smacking a fist into his palm. "You shoulda left me to run off my energy, Mask…"

Kevin looked about himself, a little alarmed to find that they were somehow a long way from the group back on the beach, and on a small, remote, island of rocks rather than an extension of the coastline of the main island the others were still on. Mars looked wild and insatiable, the ground around them was uneven and sharp, there was very little space for them both to stand out of the water and – as if it were some sort of final insult from Jacqueline McMadd herself – a few shadows and spikes were gathering, following the line Mars's bloodied feet had swam in.

"You need to calm down," Kevin said carefully. "You've completely knackered yourself, and we're surrounded by sharks. Now I'm pretty sure I could get past the bastards, but you're covered in blood and weaker than you think, so I don't much fancy your chances of escape, mate."

"Sharks?" Mars echoed, scowling at Kevin.

Kevin pointed several times to indicate the various directions the beasts were approaching from. He was surprised to see that there were even more sharks approaching than he had noticed the first time around; but he was positively shocked when Mars then clapped his hands and let out a short laugh of delight.

"Shark steak for dinner, baby!" he said cheerfully, walking over to the very edge of the small rocky island to peer into the water.

Kevin cringed as tiny drops of blood slipped from Mars's face into the water, drawing one of the closest sharks closer still. Kevin backed up a step as the triangular fin turned in Mars's direction, moving directly towards him.

"Um, Mars?" he began. "I don't think you really want to do this…"

Mars leaned over a little more, and in an instant the shark's head shot out of the water and Mars vomited onto it. Kevin froze, wondering if his eyes were deceiving him; but as he saw the vomit-stained shark sink back into the water, he reluctantly admitted to himself that, as ridiculous as it seemed, Mars had just thrown up on a shark. As he tried to fathom the situation, Kevin saw Mars sway a little before his weight began to tip forwards. Kevin hurriedly darted towards him, smacking him in the chest with a forceful clothesline, sending him falling in the opposite direction. Mars let out a cry of protest as his bared back hit the jagged rocks, before rolling onto his side and vomiting again.

"You're a bloody arsehole," Kevin grumbled, grabbing at Mars's mask.

Mars grumbled out an indecipherable complaint, but his eyes glazed over in a moment of semi-consciousness, which allowed Kevin to tear the mask from his head. It hissed and faded to red in Kevin's hands, but he flung it aside, turning his attention to Mars, who appeared to be regaining his senses.

"You look like shit," Kevin told him as their eyes met.

"Hey fuck you!" Mars growled back.

Kevin pulled a face at Mars, who of course did not see it through Kevin's mask. He had not meant to insult his friend, he had merely been making a statement of fact: Mars did look terrible. He was clearly both exhausted and dehydrated, his entire body was coated in a slimy combination of sweat, blood and seawater, he was growing facial hair in uneven tufts about his face and neck and apparently Kevin's accusations about Mars wearing make-up had been correct, as he had a distinctly pale look about the corners of his eyes.

"I just hope that we complete this task on time today," Kevin said with a sigh. "Because I don't want to have to look at you looking like shit any longer."

"You cheeky bastard," Mars groaned.

"I wish I was being cheeky…" Kevin muttered.

Mars started to sit up but his eyes glazed over again and he fell sharply back, cracking the side of his head against a rock.

"Just stay where you are," Kevin advised. "Or in a few hours' time you'll be nothing more than a steaming pile of shark shit."

Mars chuckled a little.

"Dat ain't funny," he said. "Sharks shit in da water. Dere ain't no steam under water."

"You laughed," Kevin pointed out, turning to sit at Mars's side and crossing his legs in front of himself.

Mars snorted, and assuming that the conversation was over, Kevin turned his attention first to the main island, visually confirming that Terry was still running, before scanning across the water to assess the shark problem.

"It ain't like I ain't ever thought about it before, y'know."

Kevin frowned a little, but kept silent and kept his head turned away from Mars.

"I've thought about it a lot. All my life. Ever since Doomsmane scarred me. I've wondered… I screwed up real bad, like maybe I got some kinda evil inside me or somethin'. And… Y'know, what if… What if it's genetic? A lotta guys in da DMP were second generation. What if dat happens to me? What if I create a monster like… I don't want dat Kev, and I sure don't wanna put dat on Kiki."

Kevin turned his head up to the sky and began slowly looking about himself. Behind him he heard Mars let out a short, sharp sigh of frustration.

"Kev, come on!" he moaned. "Help me out here! What do I do if da baby is a monster?"

"I think we're safe out here," Kevin said quietly unhooking his mask. "I don't want this conversation caught on camera."

Kevin removed his mask and placed it down next to Mars's headdress before pushing his fingers through his hair to lift it back from his face.

"You might not like what I'm about to tell you, Mars," Kevin said frankly, turning to face his friend. "But if you're going to get reckless and almost kill yourself over this, here goes…"

* * *

"Neither you or I are truly human. When a human woman carries the child of a superhuman, it puts a tremendous strain on her body. My mother was hospitalised for weeks after I was born, she was lucky to survive. I remember her face after Edward was born. She looked like she was dead. It was horrible. I asked my father if it had been the same when I was born, and the bastard said it had. I hated myself and I hated my brother for doing that to my mother. I would never willingly put a human through the pain and suffering I saw in my mother's eyes when she bore my brother. Kid Muscle is a selfish bastard, talking about fathering five children. He'd be lucky if his wife made it through one, let alone five. And it's not just the physical strain: we could die in our next fight, and that leaves a woman behind raising a child who, by the age of seven, will probably out-weigh her and be taller than her. I was a complete arsehole when I was a teenager, and I know that you were too. Do you really think that's fair to leave a woman on her own, breaking her heart with worry over a hot headed, over-confident and disrespectful younger version of you? And more to the point, how exactly are you meant to raise a superhuman child? King Muscle fucked it up by being too liberal, my father fucked it up by being too strict. We all grew up resenting our parents, especially our fathers: you, me, Terry, Pumpinator… Even Kid Muscle resented his old man. I don't think I could do any better. I'm only good for fighting, and so are you. We weren't meant for all this humanitarian shit. Mars, if you still believe in God I suggest you start praying that the baby is not yours, because if it is, it will be the biggest regret of your life."

Kiki clenched her fists around the magazine resting on her lap, her entire body shaking so much the pages began to flap beneath her. She bared her teeth as a tear slid from her chin and landed on one of her fists, her mind alternating between unbridled anger and inconsolable grief.

"Holy shit!" Trixie gasped, shaking her head.

"I-is that true…?" Dorothy asked quietly.

"I hope not…" Roxanne muttered, her voice faltering a little as tears welled in her eyes.

"Shit Kev," Mars said, drawing the girls' attention back to the television in front of them. "I've put Kiki through so much already, I didn't think it would be… Ah shit, I don't ever think about anythin'!"

"You just have to hope that it's not Kiki," Kevin told him. "And just be more careful when you get back to her… Edward doesn't need any more fucking "Anarchists", right?"

"Dat ain't even funny, Kev," Mars shot back. "I don't want my boy gettin' involved wid your crazy-ass brother."

"Assuming, of course, that it was a boy."

"Huh?"

"Well, knowing you, it would probably be a girl. Pfft, now there's a thought! A little red-haired, yellow-eyed, freckled girl, with a face like an arse and a mouth that never stops."

"Hey, I ain't got a face like an arse, and nor does Kiki, so what da hell are you tryin' to say here, huh?"

"You do have a face like an arse. I hope your Max Factor arrives soon."

"Kiss my ass, I'm still better lookin' dan you are!"

"You wish."

"Shit Kev, I hope it ain't mine."

"It's probably Kid's or Terry's."

"Well good. Roxanne is a tight-ass mother-fucker and dat Trixie is just a cheap, nasty whore. I ain't gonna lose no sleep of one of dose bitches snuffs it makin' some ugly baby."

"I don't know, Roxanne is probably alright."

"Yeah I guess she's got a real nice ass, but it ain't gonna be worth shit after she gains like 80 pounds carryin' herself a couple o' Kinniku piglets."

"True. But do you really want to see Trixie with a baby? Have you seen that girl's family? She would probably call the baby something naff and smother it in bling."

Mars laughed until he turned pale and was apparently forced to stop.

"Hey, gotta be better'n dressin' your kid in an iron mask, right?" he said.

"Oh fuck you," Kevin snorted. "At least I would have the decency to hide my child's face. We'd all have to suffer looking at your little bastard."

"Hey, my baby ain't no bastard."

"Did you marry Kiki?"

"No, but–"

"Then technically speaking, your baby is a bastard, right?"

"Fuck you, man."

Roxanne's top lip slowly peeled back to reveal a sneer worthy of a Devil Chojin.

"I'm a "tight-ass mother-fucker"?" she asked the television.

"I'm a cheap nasty whore?" Trixie wailed.

"I'm going to kill Mars when he gets off that island!" Roxanne swore, waving a fist at his image on the screen. "He keeps making me sound like a total bitch!"

"Yeah, but Kevin isn't exactly any better," Trixie pointed out.

"I had no idea he felt this way about…" Kiki began, inadvertently tearing a page from the magazine crumpled in her fists.

"Ditto," Amy said darkly, folding her arms and thinning her eyes at the screen.

"Girls, maybe you shouldn't be watching this," Marie tried gently.

"But mom, Kevin and Mars are disrespecting me on live, international television!" Roxanne argued back.

"Honey try to stay calm," Marie replied. "Meat thinks he knows a way to end all of this, I came over here to talk to you about his plan."

"Screw Meat's plan!" Trixie said, standing abruptly. "I say we all hire ourselves a helicopter and fly out there! Let's push Mars and Kevin in and let the sharks deal with them!"

"Trixie!" Kiki roared, standing at her side. "Didn't you hear what they just said? Raising a Chojin child is hell when you're on your own! Nobody is killing anybody!"

"Really?" Roxanne asked. "That's a pity, because I was thinking about tearing Jacqueline McMadd apart… Who's with me?"

"Girls, please!" Marie yelled as she suddenly found herself facing a swarm of enraged females. "Sit down, relax, and listen to what I have to tell you. Please."

Roxanne sighed, slouching her shoulders in defeat.

"Fine," she agreed.

The others slowly sat down around her, their eyes wandering back to the screen, their faces twisting as they saw Mars try to pull Kevin's mask down over his head as Kevin struck a pose in Mars's head-dress.

* * *

"I would make a shit-hot dad."

Dik Dik and Terry turned to each other, each relieved to see that the other looked as unimpressed as he felt.

"Think about it: I design and build all my own toys and clothes. Kids love me. I'm really sexy, and I have the ultimate genes. Any kid of mine is gonna totally rock. I just wonder if it will be a boy, a gorgeous little stud-muffin like me, or if it will be a girl, a smoking-hot babe like Roxanne."

Wally dropped onto the sand next to Terry, who patted him on the back.

"You did good," he assured him.

"We're falling behind," Wally said breathlessly. "And after Kevin, we only have Kid left to run!"

"Kevin said he'll finish the task," Terry pointed out, glancing at Kevin, who had begun his shift running on the treadmill.

"I think if it was a boy, I would call him Mantaro. But if it was a girl, I would call her… Mantaro."

"Hey, who wants steak?" Mars asked.

"Me!" Jaeger said cheerfully, holding out a plate eagerly.

"Hey, you caught one of the sharks?" Wally brightened.

"I caught a whole flock o' sharks," Mars replied with a grin.

"I'm gonna have to get my dad to send me a mask for my kid. I think I'll get a really cool-looking mask, like the one uncle Ataru has. Or maybe just a plain one like mine, so that the kid looks more like me… I dunno what would look best, I'd kinda need to see it to know for sure…"

Kid tapped a finger against his chin in thought for a moment before suddenly grinning as though an idea had occurred to him. He drew in a deep breath to share it with the others, but before he could begin, something landed hard in his lap, and looking down, the sight that greeted him made him scream in alarm.

"Damn, that was fast!" he shrieked. "Roxanne gave birth already, and they sent the baby here to see me! Look you guys!"

The others all grunted in alarm as Kid held out a miniature version of himself, grinning inanely at the others.

"Hey little man, da hell did you get here?" Mars said.

The others snapped out of their trance, and began to smile.

"Meat!" Terry cried. "How in the heck did ya get here?"

Meat groaned, his head lolling back.

"Meat?" Kid echoed, yanking Meat back and turning him around to look down at his face. "I guess he does kinda look like Meat, but that would be really confusing if I called him Meat, because that's my manager's name."

"You damn idiot…" Terry grumbled, lifting Meat from Kid's hands and placing him on his feet.

"Meat, are you okay?" Wally asked.

Meat blinked a few times, adjusting his glasses with one hand and straightening his cloak with the other.

"Boys…" he said slowly.

"He just said his first word already!" Kid squealed.

"Hey, shut-up, ya dumb-ass!" Mars yelled, jabbing Kid's arm with a sharpened stick he had been using as a skewer to cook the shark.

"I-I can't believe it worked!" Meat said slowly. "I'm really here! Now all I gotta do is intercept the radio signal, and then we can all get the hell outta here!"

"You're getting us off this island?" Dik Dik cried, his eyes doubling in size in his excitement.

"Sure thing!" Meat agreed, nodding his head. "We gotta pregnant girl back at HQ, and I think tha… That…"

Meat staggered around a little, and Terry, Dik Dik, Jaeger and Wally all reached out their hands to steady him.

"Whoa…" he groaned. "I gotta… Just… And… Kid…"

Meat went limp in the hands of those around him, leaving them staring at him in utter shock.

"He knows who the father is!" Terry yelled out.

"Wake him up!" Mars said, pouncing towards them.

"We're trying!" Wally wailed.

"Try harder!" Jaeger insisted.

"I don't understand what just happened…" Kid muttered, scratching at his head.

Kid turned from the ensuing melee, watching Kevin Mask run as the counter mounted on the machine informed them that they still had to circumnavigate the globe ten times before nightfall, which, judging by the low level of the sun, was rapidly approaching.

"Hey Kevin!" Kid called over to him. "Hurry up dude, you're not gonna make it!"

"I didn't see you take a turn at this!" Kevin yelled back at him angrily.

Kid whimpered a little, surprised that Kevin had actually heard him.

"Well I can't do it!" Kid called back after he had regained his composure.

"Probably not," Kevin sneered.

"No dude, I really can't!" Kid insisted. "My penis kinda hurts today, I don't wanna risk anything."

Kevin began swearing in a way that was sure to send the show to a commercial break, but Kid appeared not to care.

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The Muscle League decide to leave the beach in a bid to hide from the cameras after learning that Kevin and Mars's discussion was broadcast and witnessed by the girls, but their plans are in danger of being jeopardised when Meat falls ill and food supplies run low. Back at HQ the girls try to stop watching the show, but find it difficult to turn away when a certain piece of footage is replayed: completely uncensored. **Chapter 9 – The Great Escape**.


	9. The Great Escape

**Recap:** Meat managed to get himself to the island, but passed out before he could be of any help to the Muscle League. Kevin and Mars had a frank discussion about babies, fatherhood and the girls that was – unfortunately for them – caught on camera and broadcast live on television; the girls were not happy with what they heard…

* * *

**Chapter 9 – The Great Escape**

Kevin tried to push himself harder, tried to fight the exhaustion that was rapidly taking over his being, tried to finish the running task before the sun disappeared from view; but his body was refusing to co-operate. Something had not settled in the pit of his stomach since lunchtime that day. Mars suggested that it had been the slightly less-than-fresh pork meat he had eaten, but Kevin suspected it was not something physical that was tormenting his senses, but rather something psychological, particularly since he had been unable to shake the memories of his mother after the birth of Edward since relating them to Mars.

The Bad Blood Tournament had ended several months earlier, but Kevin was distinctly aware that since it had occurred, life had not quite been the same. Something was wrong, but he could figure out just what it was, and for some reason, the nagging idea that something was amiss was playing on his mind, and for the first time in his life, he found his own thoughts distracting him from physical activity.

"Dude, you know, you really need to step it up."

Kevin shifted his eyes to Kid Muscle, who was standing picking his nose as he watched Kevin run. It was the Muscle League's sixth day on the island, and after six days without proper food, exercise facilities, cleaning facilities, toilets and only each other for company, they all looked a little rundown. But for some completely bizarre and inexplicable reason, Kid Muscle looked as though he had been washed ashore after one hundred and six days at sea. Kevin contemplated asking the Kinniku prince why he looked so much worse than everyone else, but Kid suddenly let loose a fart that almost suffocated Kevin, causing him to trip and fall off the treadmill.

"You son of a bitch!" Mars yelled, waving a fist at them from across the beach.

"Kid, what the hell are ya doin'?" Terry called over. "We ain't got time for this, leave Kevin be!"

Kevin coughed and spluttered, struggling with his mask as he began to retch, trying desperately to get the mask off before he vomited into it. Through his struggle he saw Kid wander over to the running machine, eying it over curiously for a moment before hopping onto it and breaking into a run. Kevin paused, his mask at an odd angle, metal covering one of his eyes, but the other still peering through the eyehole. He watched on in disbelief as Kid Muscle let out a roar of determination, a brilliant blue glow illuminating the dusky beach around them as he broke into a shockingly fast sprint.

Kevin struggled with his mask again, finally removing it in time to see the counter above Kid clock 3.2 million kilometres in the instant before the last twinkle of sunlight faded on the horizon. Kid leapt off of the machine and began punching at the air, his grin so wide his fish lips obscured his neck and most of the rest of his head.

"Lucky son of a bitch…" Terry muttered.

"Did you see that?" Kid whooped, leaping around in delight. "I totally nailed the task and saved us all! You all voted for me to leave the island, but I just saved you all! I did it, even though my penis kinda hurts."

"You are a penis!" Mars snapped irritably as Kid danced around him.

Kid appeared not to hear Mars's insult though, as he continued dancing around, only stopping as the sphere carrying Doc and Mac began to descend towards them.

"Well at least things might be a little more civilised around here from now on," Terry muttered as the sphere landed softly on the sand.

"Or not," Dik Dik said dryly. "After all, Kid Muscle and Mars are still here."

"Hey!" Kid and Mars both snapped.

Dik Dik merely rolled his eyes in reply. The sphere began to open, and the sight that greeted the awaiting Chojins made them all gasp in shock.

"Hey, are you guys okay?" Wally asked, stepping closer to the sphere.

"No sleep!" Mac said a little too loudly, holding up a half-drunk mug of thick, black coffee in a shaking hand. "Twenty-four hour show!"

"Can't sleep!" Doc yelled. "Here's your prize!"

Doc and Mac began hurling small backpacks at the contestants, who all yelled out complaints until the barrage stopped.

"Hey Kevin, Mars?" Mac yelled, apparently unable to control the volume of his voice.

Kevin and Mars leaned a little closer to the sphere, warily eying Mac over. He had removed his suit jacket, rolled up the sleeves of his shirt to the elbow, opened the collar, tied his tie around his forehead, and his face was unusually dark, between the bushy beard he had grown and the thick dark circles beneath his eyes.

"You can't get away from the cameras here, they follow you everywhere," he continued.

"It's the same at HQ," Doc added, his voice no less quiet than Mac's.

Doc had given up hiding his baldhead, his eyes as black as Mac's, and a splatter or grey stubble dirtying the lower half of his face.

"See?" Mac said suddenly, pointing over his shoulder at the screen mounted behind them.

Doc tapped at a few buttons on the console in front of him with shaking fingers, bringing up an image of Roxanne and Trixie, apparently filmed by a hidden camera spying on them in a hallway within the IWF headquarters.

"Kevin Mask is such a dick," Trixie said. "I can't believe he called me a cheap nasty whore! He's the whore!"

"Yeah, and where does Mars get off saying I'm gonna get fat when I become a mom?" Roxanne added.

"They're a pair of insensitive c–"

The image switched to another before Trixie could finish her insult as Doc pressed a button, another apparent hidden camera filming Sally and Kiki playing on the screen.

"What am I gonna do?" Kiki wailed.

Sally put an arm around Kiki's shoulders and gave her a reassuring squeeze.

"I'm so scared!" Kiki sobbed.

"It's okay, it will be fine!" Sally said softly. "Don't listen to Kevin Mask, and Mars is just… Panicking. I'm sure neither of them meant what they said."

Doc pressed another button, revealing yet another secretly filmed scene from the IWF headquarters, this time showing a tall figure standing in a long, sweeping coat, a large yellow suitcase in one hand.

"Are you leaving?" Roxanne asked, dashing onto the screen.

"Yeah. I'm going to ask King Muscle if he'll take me back as his chef. Do you want to come with me?"

"Well…"

Doc pressed another button and the screen went blank.

"Hey, put that back on!" Kid demanded. "Did Roxanne go to Muscle Planet or not?"

"We're not allowed to say," Doc shouted.

"Already said too much!" Mac added.

"Like hell you have!" Kevin snapped, lunging at the sphere.

But before he could reach it, the sphere shot up into the air, the roof snapping shut, hiding the commentators from view.

"Dose camera can't follow us everywhere," Mars said darkly, picking up a backpack and eying it over thoughtfully. "I say we pack up da food and move away from here. Go into da jungle and hide out until dey end dis shit and send a helicopter."

"Good idea," Kevin admitted, standing up and dusting the sand from his jeans. "But we might not need to go that far. Where's Meat?"

The others turned to Wally, who was holding Meat's limp form in his arms.

"He doesn't look so good," Wally said quietly.

"That's how he always looks!" Kevin said dismissively. "Wake him up!"

"We can't!" Terry cut in. "He ain't doin' so well, we think he hurt himself on the way here, or else he's caught somethin'."

Kevin sighed, scratching at his head as he considered his options. If Meat was incapacitated, he would be of no help, and perhaps Mars's plan would be the most effective and efficient for escaping the island. And, he thought to himself, if Amy was trying to get back to Muscle Planet, he really had to get off the island quite quickly.

"Everybody pack a bag, we'll start tonight, camp out in the jungle, and tomorrow morning, we'll go deeper into the trees," he concluded. "Kid Muscle, you ran away into the jungle, Dik Dik Van Dik, you've been quite far in looking for food, the two of you can help guide us since you already know which areas are exposed to cameras."

Dik Dik nodded and Kid adjusted his crotch with a small wince.

"One way or another, we're getting off this island," Kevin said with finality.

"Alright!" Terry said, putting out his hand.

The others all clapped their hands on top of each other's before setting about packing up anything useful from the beach and preparing to journey into the jungle.

* * *

Kiki sniffed, dabbing at her nose with a soggy tissue. She smiled a little as she sighted Amy's suitcase, which was bright yellow and covered with Hello Kitty faces.

"Hey, I love your case," she said, sitting down next to Amy.

"Thanks," Amy replied with a small nod.

"I bet Kevin hates it," Kiki added.

"I don't really care what he thinks about anything any more," Amy said coldly.

"Oh…"

Kiki started to look about herself, feeling a little awkward after Amy's last remark; but she soon found something that made her forget all about Amy's cold words.

"Roxanne!" she yelped. "Are you leaving too?"

Roxanne sighed, placing down a suitcase by Amy's.

"I can't stay here Kiki, I'm going crazy!" Roxanne said with a sigh. "If it's not Kid doing something stupid on the show it's Kevin saying something embarrassing or Mars insulting me!"

"Mars didn't mean any of those things!" Kiki whimpered, tears welling in her eyes.

"Well…" Roxanne began, kicking at her case as words escaped her.

"You should come with us too," Amy suggested, turning to Kiki.

"Hey, that's a great idea!" Roxanne brightened. "Come with us, Kiki! We'll take Trixie too!"

"I don't know if I should…" Kiki said slowly.

"Go on Kiki, we'll have a fantastic time!" Roxanne insisted. "Look, here comes Suguru now, I bet if we ask him, he'd love to have us all stay with him!"

"King Muscle!" Amy said, standing as he approached.

"Hello," he greeted her, tilting his head a little.

"I want to ask for my old job back," Amy asked. "I want to go back to Muscle Planet with you."

"Your old job…?" King Muscle said curiously, scratching at his head.

"Yes…" Amy said slowly, looking a little concerned. "If you'll have me, of course."

"Who are you?" King Muscle asked her.

"Amy," Amy replied. "Amy MacLeod."

King Muscle shook his head and shrugged.

"I worked for you at Muscleham Palace!" Amy continued. "I only left because I was abducted by Edward Mask, and then…"

Amy tilted her head to one side as King Muscle continued to stare blankly at her.

"I was your chef," she said flatly.

"Chef?" he said slowly. "My chef left. I don't remember why…"

Amy groaned, hanging her head in despair.

"Hey, Suguru, can we come and stay with you until this stupid show is over?" Roxanne asked, stepping forwards. "We're all getting sick of Jacqueline McMadd twisting everything, and we need to get away. Can we come stay with you?"

King Muscle opened his mouth to reply but stopped short as Belinda slapped him on the chest and stepped between him and the girls.

"I don't think that's a good idea," she said. "I'm sorry Roxanne, I know this must be hard for you, but… Well, I don't think running away is the right answer."

Roxanne turned and looked back at Kiki and Amy before slowly nodding her head.

"I guess so," she reluctantly agreed. "I just hope Meat pulls through for us."

* * *

Kevin rubbed sleepily at his eyes before pushing his hair back from his face. Since Amy had introduced him to hairbrushes he was beginning to see the advantage of using them, as his hair had become positively wild since landing on the island. Scratching at his cheek he could feel that he had grown a substantial coating of facial hair, which was only making the heat all the more unbearable. As his hand dropped to his side it collided with his backpack, which he had used as a pillow the night before. Kevin allowed himself to smile in relief as he felt the shape of a can of shaving foam, gladly hoisting up the bag and carrying it over the large pool by the foot of a small waterfall the gang had chosen to set up camp next to.

Yawning and looking about to check that the others were all still asleep, Kevin opened his bag and retrieved his newly acquired toiletries before scratching his rear end, spitting and stripping off his clothes.

Kevin leapt into the pool and dunked himself under the water, relaxing below the water's surface for a moment before resurfacing and grabbing a bottle of body wash and gladly squirting it over himself. He stepped up onto the rocks by the edge of the pool and soaped himself up, including his hair, and then dived back in, swimming around until the soap bubbles disappeared from the water. He then hopped out of the water, sitting by the edge and lifting his hair back over his shoulders. He sprayed the shaving foam over his face and happily shaved it off again, feeling immensely relieved to be clean again.

A small, light breeze swept by, carrying a sweet scent with it. Kevin lifted his chin sniffing experimentally at the air, before realising that the smell was in fact coming from his own hair. He pulled a chunk of dripping wet blonde hair over his right shoulder, lifting it up to his nose and sniffing at, smiling when he found that it was in fact his hair that smelt so sweet.

Kevin froze, his finger still pressing his wet hair against his nose, his eyes locked onto a pair of golden eyes staring back at him with as much horror as he suddenly felt.

Sitting a short distance from him, by the edge of the pool, was a naked Mars, looking suddenly clean and a little more like his usual self – though he appeared a little asymmetrical somehow. As his hand wavered a little at the side of his head, Kevin suddenly realised what was amiss about his friend: apparently Mars had only finished applying eyeliner to one eye, and was just starting on the other.

"Hey Kev," Mars said in a low voice. "Whatcha doin'?"

Kevin hurriedly dropped his hair and straightened his back defensively.

"Mars," he said tightly. "What are you doing?"

"Uh…" Mars began, looking down at the eyeliner pen in his hand. "Um…"

Kevin arched his eyebrows expectantly as he watched Mars apparently debate what to do next.

"You might as well finish what you started," Kevin suggested.

"Yeah…" Mars said slowly. "Hey, you ain't gonna tell nobody about dis, right?"

"Sure," Kevin said, before clearing his throat awkwardly.

"Besides…" Mars began, lifting the pen to his eye again. "It ain't like I was gettin' off on da smell o' my own hair…"

Kevin growled to himself.

"Well thank fuck we're not on camera now," he grumbled. "Because anybody who saw us like this would never believe that we were Chojin Crown finalists!"

"Yeah," Mars said slowly. "I guess not, huh?"

Kevin looked down at the water for a moment, before a smile began to tug at his lips.

"Mars?" he said quietly, turning to grin slyly at his friend.

"Yeah?" Mars grunted, dropping his eyeliner pen back into his bag.

"How long have you been doing that?" Kevin asked.

"Doin' what?" Mars asked.

"Y'know…" Kevin said, pointing at his back. "Wearing make-up."

"Hey, you said we wasn't gonna talk about dis! How long have you been sniffin' your own hair?"

"I was just curious! I never saw you do it before, but when I think about it, you've always had that sort of definition about your eyes. Were you doing that when we were in the DMP?"

"Dat ain't important."

"Bloody hell Mars! What if Doomsmane had caught you – oh, Mars, no! He did catch you?"

"Yeah, well dat ain't nothin'! What about dat time I caught you wid your hand in your–"

"I already told you, I was having a scratch!"

"Yeah, maybe "scratch" is da word you use in England, but where I come from, it's called havin' a wan–"

"I was very alone!"

"I took you to Da Palace, you moron! Why da hell do ya think I always went dere, huh?"

"But that was despicable!"

"More despicable dan usin' your own sock to jer–"

"We're not having this conversation!"

"Okay."

Kevin growled out frustrated sigh, kicking at the water.

"Hey, y'know, dis ain't easy for me neither," Mars said quietly. "Bein' stuck here like dis for no good reason… It's like bein' back at da damn Hercules Factory. Man, dose days were hell."

"Was it harder than training at the DMP?" Kevin asked.

"No, it was about da same," Mars replied. "But I couldn't go nowhere, and I was surrounded by a bunch a do-gooder assholes. I got no fun and I got no… Release…"

Kevin nodded his understanding.

"It's real hard," Mars continued. "Dat's been a week since we got here, and I ain't had no lovin' for along time before dat, cause Kiki was still mad about me puttin' my ass on dose five grand notes."

Kevin snorted, his shoulders shaking a little.

"What the bloody hell were you thinking, anyway?" he asked. "Why did you do it?"

"I was bored," Mars replied with a shrug.

"You're an idiot!" Kevin scolded him.

"Oh yeah?" Mars sneered. "Well at least I ain't livin' in da castle Nick Hasler filmed his little music video in!"

"You were living there!" Kevin pointed out.

"I ain't no more!"

"Better to live where a music video was filmed than at my girlfriend's parents' house!"

"You live in your daddy's house!"

"Shut-up, bitch!"

Kevin kicked at the water, sending a wave of water at Mars. Mars scowled at him before copying his action, kicking water at Kevin. They paused, eying each other over for a moment before kicking and swiping at the water, sending waves of water tumbling over the edges of the pool. After a several seconds of frenzied splashing, Mars slowly began to stop, his eyes thinning as he found Kevin doubled over with laughter.

"Da hell is wrong wid you?" he demanded.

"Your face…" Kevin laughed.

Mars looked down at the partially reflective surface of the water, finding black smudges around his eyes that were starting to drip down his face.

"You rat-bastard!" he yelled, launching himself into the air and colliding with Kevin.

The two wrestled on in the water, oblivious to the fact that they had gained themselves an audience.

"Hey Jaeger, does watching that make you hot?" Kid asked Jaeger.

Jaeger glowered at Kid for a moment before punching him hard in the jaw.

* * *

"Watching this is making me so hot!"

Roxanne turned sharply to Trixie, staring at her with wide eyes.

"I'm hormonal!" Trixie defended herself.

"I hope they show this in the highlights show tonight…" Dorothy said with a sigh. "Then maybe there won't be those little black boxes spoiling our view."

"Hey!" Kiki snapped, rounding on Dorothy angrily. "You shouldn't be looking at my boyfriend's… Bits! He's my boyfriend, and you're too young to be thinking like that!"

Kiki sat back hard in her chair, her eyes slowly moving to Roxanne and Trixie at her side, who were both staring at her with varying degrees of amusement.

"That was stupid," she concluded. "Dorothy, I'm sorry I snapped at you. I've just got so much on my mind right now. I totally forgot that everyone has already seen Mars naked about a million times anyway…"

* * *

"Suguru!"

Kid blinked owlishly as Meat staggered towards him with out-stretched arms and a goofy grin.

"It's Mantaro," Kid corrected him. "Man-ta-ro."

"Whatcha doin', Suguru?" Meat asked. "I already told ya: Miss Marie invited me to dinner, not you! You stay away from her, I saw her first!"

Kid leaned back as Meat swung a fist at him, watching bemusedly as he spun around on one foot before dropping to his knees.

"It sure is cold in here," he said. "Did you leave the door open again, Suguru?"

Kid tilted his head to one side as he watched Meat collapse to the ground and shiver, despite being directly under the mid-day sun.

"Hey you guys?" he said slowly. "There's something seriously wrong with Meat. I think he needs to see a doctor, he's not well."

"I reckon he's got a fever," Terry concluded.

"Well with any luck we'll all be off this island by sundown, and he can see a doctor when we get back home," Kevin said.

"But what if we don't get off the island tonight?" Kid asked. "Or tomorrow? Or the next day? What if we do have to stay here for eight weeks? What if Meat just gets sicker? He might… Kev, we have to do something."

Kevin was silently glad that he was wearing his mask, because his face had just contorted into a look of sceptical disgust. Kid Muscle never usually got serious about anything, least of all another person's welfare, but he looked particularly determined, and he did have a good point: Meat did look terrible.

"If we turn back now, we'll never got off dis island," Mars said.

"We can't let Meat die!" Terry argued.

"I think I agree with Mars," Dik Dik said slowly. "If we can hold out here for the next 24 hours, HQ are bound to send help. If we stay off camera, they won't have a show, and without a show, they have no reason to keep us here. They'll make more money off of us if they fly us back to Tokyo and make us do some pointless promo work."

"But you guys, what about Meat?" Wally pleaded. "Think about all he's done for us! He really is unwell we can't let him suffer! Think of all he must have gone through just to get here! He did all that just for us, we have to help him out!"

"But if he can hold on for just a day, maybe ve can all get off zhis island," Jaeger said, rubbing his chin as he eyed Meat over thoughtfully.

"We've gotta go back," Kid insisted.

"I don't really want to go back…" Kevin said carefully. "And the decision to go back isn't a unanimous one."

"Fine then!" Kid snapped. "I'll go back myself!"

"I'm comin' with ya, Kid!" Terry agreed.

"Me too," Wally said.

"Hey, it ain't good if we split up now!" Mars said, leaping in front of Kid to block his exit.

"Again, surprisingly, Mars is right," Dik Dik said with a small sigh. "We have to stick together. Either we all go back, or none of us do. I really think we should stay here a bit longer. They can't have a show if they can't film us."

"I zhink Meat vill be fine after some rest," Jaeger offered.

"He slept all night!" Kid yelled back. "He slept while we came here, he slept while we did, and he only woke up for like ten seconds just now!"

"Wake him up," Kevin suggested.

"Do what?" Terry echoed.

"Wake him up," Kevin repeated. "He could have been talking in his sleep, he wasn't making much sense. Wake him up and let's see how he is today. If he's still a blabbering idiot, we'll take him back to the beach and ask for help. If he's a bit more coherent, we carry on into the jungle."

Kid scrunched up his face at Kevin in a look he had not seen on the Kinniku's prince face since the Chojin Crown.

"You're a asshole, Kevin," he grumbled. "You never did like Meat. You still hate him because he saved Turbinski's life after you tried to kill him."

Kid turned his back on Kevin and dropped to his knees by Meat's side.

"Meat?" he said softly, pushing at Meat's shoulder.

"Hey Meat?" Terry tried.

"C'mon Meat, wake up!" Kid said. "Marie's here to see you!"

"Huh?" Meat groaned, his head moving from side to side and one leg twitching.

"Marie's here!" Kid repeated.

"M-miss Marie?" Meat muttered, slowly sitting up and clapping a hand against his forehead.

Meat slowly looked about himself, pausing as he looked at Kevin, Jaeger and Terry.

"Meat?" Kid said, bringing Meat's attention to him.

"Prince!" Meat brightened leaping up and grabbing his arms around Kid's neck. "Boy, am I glad to see you!"

Kid smiled, hugging Meat back.

"He's fine," Kevin concluded. "Let's keep moving."

Kid got to his feet, Meat still clinging to him. Terry picked up Kid's backpack, nodding his head to indicate that he would carry it for him so that Kid could carry Meat. The group all began moving deeper into the jungle, the air becoming thick and still and the light dimming as the trees and plants around them became taller and denser. After a few moments of walking in silence, Kevin felt something tug lightly at his hair by his right side. He turned his head a little, finding Kid walking alongside him, with an amused looking Meat hanging from his neck.

"Hey Mask!" Meat said, tugging at Kevin's hair again. "You need get yourself a hair-cut! Ya look more like a damn hippie than an English gentleman!"

Kevin grumbled out a few choice words under his breath, only to become further irritated when Meat merely laughed at him.

"C'mon Mask!" he said, tugging at Kevin's hair again. "What would Alice say if she could see you now?"

Kevin stopped short, glowering angrily at Meat. Kid continued walking, and Meat peered over Kid's shoulder, waving a hand at Kevin as the distance between them grew.

"That's what I thought!" Meat called back to him.

"Fucking idiot," Kevin grumbled, adjusting his backpack over his shoulder and starting off again.

"He's gotta point," Mars said with a shrug as he fell into step with Kevin.

"Oh what?" Kevin snorted. "You're a fine one to talk about appearances!"

"I'm just sayin', it ain't like you can wear your hair dat way forever…" Mars said slowly. "Ain't nothin' uglier dan an old man wid long grey hair…"

"I'm not an old man, you cheeky son of a bitch! You're three years older than me!"

"But I'm workin' it. You look like a Nick Hasler wannabe."

"Nick Hasler doesn't have long hair!"

"Sure buddy, whatever helps ya sleep at night."

Kevin thinned his eyes at Mars, who ignored him. He had never really thought about the length of his hair before, but since Meat and Mars had pointed it out to him, he found himself struggling to remember when he had last had a haircut.

Then it occurred to him: he had not had his hair cut since he ran away from home. And that had been more than eleven years ago.

* * *

"After this, we are never going to watch this show ever again," Roxanne announced. "Never. Not while it's still running, not when they show highlights, not when it's released on DVD, never. Never, ever again. Agreed?"

"Whatever, now get out the way!" Trixie snapped. "It's starting!"

Roxanne hurriedly moved from the television set to sit down next to Trixie. The girls all watched in silent fixation as the 10pm highlight show began with the earlier footage of Kevin Mask and Mars bathing.

"Holy crap!" Dorothy squealed. "I just saw…"

"Ohh!" the girls chorused, sitting back a little.

"Hey, what's that sound?" Kiki asked.

"Huh?" Roxanne asked, her jaw hanging open, her eyes locked onto the screen.

"That sound!" Kiki insisted. "Turn the volume up, Trixie!"

Trixie fumbled about at her side, here eyes refusing to move from the image before her long enough to locate the remote. A few seconds later her fingers closed around the remote, and she brought it around, pointing it at the screen and pressing the volume key until the green bar had slid most of the way across the screen.

"Hey…" Roxanne said slowly, frowning a little. "Kiki's right! What's that… What's that sound?"

"It sounds like someone slapping something!" Kiki added.

"Repeatedly," Roxanne said.

Trixie snorted.

"That's not someone slapping something…" she said slyly. "That's something, slapping someone…"

"Huh?" Roxanne and Kiki echoed.

"Oh my goodness!" Dorothy yelped. "Look at that! It's totally slapping against his thighs!"

The girls all screamed, at first in shock, but then in delight as they located the source of the sound.

"Oh God, my parents will never let Mars back in their house after this!" Kiki groaned.

"This is so awesome!" Dorothy said with a sigh.

"Should you be watching this?" Kiki snapped at her. "You're too young to even know what that is, let alone sit and watch it… Slapping about on television!"

"Ah, leave her alone!" Trixie said with a wave of her hand.

"None of you should be watching this!" Kiki concluded, leaping to her feet.

"Oh no?" Roxanne asked, pointing at the screen.

Kiki turned to the screen to see a full-body shot of Kevin Mask, completely naked, rubbing at his hair with a towel.

"Oh my!" she gasped, dropping back down into her seat.

Trixie let out a low, sinister laugh, wiggling the remote in the air.

"I totally just recorded all of that!" she said.

"We said we weren't gonna watch any of this ever again!" Roxanne pointed out.

"You said that," Kiki muttered, grabbing the remote from Trixie. "We never agreed. Now Trixie, how do we get this thing to replay in slow motion?"

* * *

**Next Chapter:** In a bid to flush out the hiding Chojins, Jacqueline sets up another eviction from the island; but since the gang are off radar, she allows their families back at HQ to cast their votes for who should leave the island next, which rapidly dissolves into in-fighting between the girls. Back on the island, Meat's health continues to deteriorate, though the others begin to find their curiosity over-taking their concern as Meat, in his fevered state, reverts to his 1980s self. **Chapter 10 – Jungle Fever**.


	10. Jungle Fever

**A/N****: **This fic is now longer than _Bad Boys_… I thought it would be about the same length, maybe only a little bit longer. Looks like it's catching up with _I Want You Bad_ now, as I am 10 chapters, 45K words in, and there's still only been one eviction from the island (six more to go)… Not to mention the end-story as the finalists arrive back home!

**Recap:** The gang entered the jungle to escape the cameras, blissfully unaware that they were still being filmed. Meat still seemed a little weird, and the girls could not stop themselves watching the show.

* * *

**Chapter 10 – Jungle Fever**

Jacqueline growled out in frustration, balling the memo in her hand and bouncing it off of Ikeman's head.

"Don't even think about laughing at me!" she warned him as he started to smirk. "This isn't funny! How the hell can seven Chojins go missing?"

Jacqueline growled again, standing from her chair and moving over to the wall of small television screens, each displaying the footage from one of the many cameras in and around the island _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ was being broadcast from. Other than the occasional bird, shark or snake, there was no sign of movement about the island. The last camera, an aerial spy camera Jacqueline had proudly acquired from the Japanese military, had lost sound almost three hours earlier, and finally lost sight of the competitors about an hour after that. To prevent the channel from being filled with dead air, the crew had been replaying highlights of the show and commercials for IWF merchandise, but Jacqueline knew that the fans would start to lose interest if nothing new happened soon.

"I think you did this," she said darkly.

"What?" Ikeman echoed behind her.

"You did this," she repeated, rounding on her elder brother. "You made this happen! You bribed the crew to sabotage my show!"

"I wouldn't do anything so petty!" he yelped. "How dare you accuse me of such childish behaviour?"

"Can the crap, Ikeman! I've known you all my life, you've always been insanely jealous of me! You've tried to ruin everything I've ever done!"

"Hey, it's the other way around, sister! You've ruined everything of mine! You stole all my toys when you were a child, you broke all of my things, you stole the Chojin Crown from me and now you're trying to steal the chair of the IWF!"

"I've earned it! I love this business, you just love the money!"

"You love money too!"

"But I also love wrestling! You only love the money! You wouldn't care if this was a damn circus! You just want the money!"

"You know nothing of this business!"

"This isn't over, Ikeman! I won't give up. Not until I have the chair!"

Ikeman leapt back as Jacqueline stormed past him towards the door.

"Where are you going?" he asked tentatively.

"I'm going to speak to our marketing department," she said flatly. "I think it's time for a sequel, don't you?"

She slammed the door shut before Ikeman could ask her what she was talking about: though he was partially glad, as his heart was still racing. She may be a lot smaller than he was, but Ikeman was still terrified of his little sister.

* * *

"I can't believe we ain't got no more food!" Mars groaned.

"Well, we did gamble half of it on that task that Kid Muscle ruined for us…" Kevin pointed out.

"What if we starve to death?" Kid gasped. "It would be like total survivor then, cause we would have to eat each other!"

"The vote on that one was already unanimous: we're eating you first," Dik Dik said darkly.

"Ain't you meant to be a vegetarian?" Mars asked him.

"Kid's the smallest guy here," Terry said slowly. "We really oughta eat the biggest guy first. That way he would last longer, and we wouldn't need to kill nobody else so soon."

Kevin and Mars stiffened as they suddenly found six pairs of eyes looking at them.

"He's bigger than me!" they both said, pointing at each other.

"You son of a bitch!" Mars yelped, turning to Kevin. "What about all dose times I saved your ass!"

"I have more to live for," Kevin replied with a shrug. "And besides, that's an undignified end. I refuse to die that way. None of you could kill me anyway! I'd kill you all first!"

"I dunno, none of us really likes you…" Kid muttered, picking his nose and admiring his findings. "Vengeance is a pretty good motivator…"

"Who the hell are you, anyway?"

The gang fell silent all turning to Meat, who was squinting up at Mars.

"Huh?" Mars echoed.

"I don't remember you!" Meat said, waggling a finger at him. "Hey Mask, who's your friend?"

Kevin pulled a face at Meat, which of course was a waste of time, since he was wearing his mask.

"This is Mars, remember?" he said carefully.

"Huh?" Meat echoed. "Who in the hell is Mars? And where the hell is Warsman, anyway?"

Meat looked around the others with a look of confusion and mild disgust.

"And who the hell is that guy?" he asked, pointing at Wally. "And you!" he added, pointing at Dik Dik.

"That's Wally Tusket, and this here is Dik Dik Van Dik!" Terry explained. "Are feelin' alright, Meat?"

"Sure Terry, I feel great!" Meat replied. "And hey, how's Natsuko, huh?"

"Uh… My momma's fine, thanks…" Terry slowly replied.

"Hey you're a lucky guy, Terry!" Meat said, grinning slyly. "That Natsuko's got a fantastic ass!"

"Hey!" Terry yelped. "That ain't… I mean that's just… Ya can't go around talkin' about my momma like that! The hell is wrong with you?"

"Ooh!" Meat said, giggling to himself. "You're so protective of that girl!"

"Damn right I am!" Terry retorted.

"I zhink maybe he is still a little sick," Jaeger whispered to Terry.

"Hey, you!" Meat said, pointing at Jaeger. "You… You… How ya doin'?"

"Good…" Jaeger said slowly. "How are you?"

"I'm great… But I've seen the way you look at Miss Marie. Now you listen to me: you keep your hands offa her, or… Or there's gonna be trouble, ya hear?"

Jaeger began to blush, struggling to find words to respond to Meat's accusation.

"Sh-she's old enough to be my mozher!" he eventually managed.

"Older women are kinda hot though," Kid said, nodding his head. "And Marie does have a really nice rack."

Kid screamed as Meat slapped him across the face and then kicked him in the jaw.

"And you were worried he wasn't going to make it through the day…" Kevin muttered, rolling his eyes.

"He isn't himself though," Wally pointed out. "I've never heard Meat talk like that before."

"Yeah, and he can't even remember half of us!" Terry added.

"I don't think he remembers any of us," Dik Dik said. "I think he has some kind of jungle fever, he isn't making much sense."

"He remembers me!" Kid groaned from his position balled up on the ground.

"And he remembers me," Jaeger said.

"He remembers me," Kevin said. "Though I don't really appreciate him talking about my mother like that."

"Exactly!" Terry said. "He's talkin' like he remembers us, but he keeps talkin' about our mothers, like… Well it's kinda like–"

"Who cares?" Mars interrupted. "We're nearly outta food here. Unless we can catch dose birds flyin' about, we're gonna have to go back."

"You all worry too much about food," Kevin said flatly. "It wouldn't do any of you any harm to go a day without food, you know."

Kid grumbled something indecipherable before getting to his feet. Kevin cast him a cold, warning look, but Kid ignored him. Kevin started to point out that it had grown quite dark, and so the day would soon be over, and surely by morning the IWF would have sent a search party; but under the canopy of the jungle, it was almost impossible to tell what time of day it was, and they did not seem to have been travelling for very long before they stopped to eat the meal that finished their food supply.

"Hm…" he muttered, looking upwards in thought.

"It ain't good," Mars whispered to him. "We're stuck here wid no food, no girls, and dese assholes."

Kevin looked around the group, who only looked marginally better after cleaning themselves up with their newly received toiletries. Kid Muscle still looked ten times dirtier, more exhausted and untidier than the others, but Kevin was beginning to think that perhaps that was just how he normally looked and he had simply never noticed it until they landed on the island and he had been forced to spend a prolonged period of time in close company with the Kinniku prince.

"Just one more day," Kevin insisted. "I'm sure we can all hold on for just one more day, and I'm also sure those McMadds will send for us long before that."

* * *

"What the hell is this?" Trixie asked, waving a sheet of paper dangerously close to Jacqueline's nose.

Jacqueline groaned, rolling her eyes impatiently.

"I already told you," she said tightly. "It's something I thought you might like: it's a ballot paper for _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_."

"You want us to vote someone off?" Roxanne asked.

"As is implied by the ballot paper, yes, I would like you to vote for the next eviction!" Jacqueline ground out impatiently.

"I don't think that this is such a good idea…" Kiki said slowly. "We're all going to vote for our own men. You won't get a result you can work with."

"What?" Trixie snapped, rounding on Kiki.

"Well, I would of course vote for Mars," Kiki began. "Roxanne would vote for Kid, you would vote for Terry–"

"Everybody should be voting for Terry!" Trixie interrupted her, glaring around the others all holding a ballot paper. "My wedding is in three days' time! I have three days to get my fiancé back to Texas, so anybody who doesn't vote for Terry is single-handedly trying to ruin my wedding!"

"That's selfish, Trixie!" Roxanne snapped. "You can marry Terry any time! Just reschedule! What about me? I need Kid back!"

"You're little problem is nothing compared to my wedding!" Trixie yelled back at her.

"You're both being selfish!" Kiki yelled. "What about Mars? Do any of you have any idea how long I've been planning this? I'm not doing this on my own!"

"Hey, how come Wally's family get two votes?" Roxanne demanded.

"You're getting four!" Trixie snapped. "Yours, your mom's, King Muscle's and Belinda's!"

"And Kevin's getting two!" Kiki moaned. "I'm the only one here who would vote for Mars!"

"So basically you voting for Mars is a waste of time," Trixie said slyly. "You ought to vote for Terry instead."

"Maybe I'll just vote for Kevin Mask," Kiki said, turning up her nose at Trixie.

"Why would you do that?" Trixie asked. "You would vote for that dick just to piss me off?"

"No," Kiki said, shaking her head.

"What about my brother?" Dorothy shouted, jumping into the foray. "He's too sensitive to be stuck on that island with all those other jerks!"

"Screw that fat bastard, I want my Terry back!" Trixie roared, rounding on Dorothy.

"You're a horrible girl!" Dorothy retailiated.

Jacqueline stood back with a grin as she watched the cameras circle around the arguing girls, broadcasting their every word on live television. Their argument was not quite as exciting as the events on the island, but at least it would keep the viewing figures up, and once they had cast their votes, the prospect of one of the contestants getting to escape ought to be enough to bring all seven of them out of hiding.

"I'm a genius!" she said quietly to herself. "I'm a rich, successful, smart, gorgeous genius. And I'm the next chairman of the IWF…"

* * *

"Well, honestly, I thought that the vote was going to be private…" Roxanne began nervously, sweating a little under the intense heat of the spotlights shining down on her. "But my vote is really no secret anyway. I voted for Kid Muscle. Not because I don't think that he deserves to be entertaining the fans, just because I want him home."

"I voted for Terry Kenyon," Trixie said flatly as the camera shifted to her. "Just like everybody else should have done."

On a large screen behind them, a single coloured bar appeared below each of the pictures of Kid and Terry.

"I voted for Mars," Kiki said softly, a bar lighting up beneath Mars as she said his name.

"I voted for my Wally!" Mrs Tusket said.

"I voted for Wally too!" Dorothy said.

"I voted for Dik Dik Van Dik," Sally said.

"I voted for Mantaro," King Muscle said.

"I voted for Mantaro," Belinda said.

"I voted for Mantaro," Marie said.

Jacqueline tensed as the camera panned to an empty seat.

"Where the hell is Meat?" she hissed.

"On the island!" one of the crew whispered back.

"What? How the hell did that happen?"

"We have dead air!"

"Go to the next voter!"

The camera shifted to Robin Mask.

"I voted for Kevin," he said.

"I voted for Kid Muscle," Amy said flatly.

The others all turned to look at her with varying degrees of shock.

"You-you what?" Robin muttered.

"I voted for Kid Muscle," she repeated. "I like Kid. He's not a total dick-head."

"Holy shit!" Trixie muttered, turning to Roxanne with wide eyes.

"Hey Amy, are you sure?" Kiki called over to her.

"Yeah Amy, look!" Roxanne said, pointing at the scoreboard behind them. "Kid's already got loads of votes, he'll be up for eviction regardless of how you vote! If you vote for Kevin, he'll have two votes, and that means he'll be up for eviction with Kid and Wally! You want him off the island, right?"

"Not particularly," Amy said coldly.

"O-kay…" Trixie said slowly, her eyebrows twisting on her forehead.

"There you have it, viewers!" Jacqueline said confidently, strutting out in front of the camera, blocking out the girls behind her. "The phone lines will open at midnight tonight and close at 8pm tomorrow evening. Call in for who you would most like to see leave the island: Kid Muscle or Wally Tusket!"

* * *

"Kevin!"

Kevin groaned, rolling onto his back.

"Kevin, wake up!"

"Amy, it's the middle of the night!" Kevin mumbled.

"Dude, you gotta wake up! Please!"

"Hm-uh?"

Kevin slowly blinked, his dull surroundings gradually coming into focus. He grunted out a noise of alarm, scrambling back as he found himself looking directly up at Kid Muscle, who was leaning over him with what could only be described as a look of fearful concern.

"Kevin, Meat's gone totally nuts!" Kid hissed.

Kevin sat up and looked about himself, finding the other five Chojins still sleeping soundly. The partial light around them suggested that it was past dawn, but as he still felt tired, he could only assume that it was still very early.

"What are you talking about?" he groaned, turning back to Kid.

Kid whimpered out a small noise and pointed off to one side. Kevin turned in the direction Kid's finger was aimed, his eyes doubling in size at what he found. Standing atop a large boulder was what appeared to be a hungry, angry pygmy.

"What are we gonna do?" Kid hissed.

Kevin slowly got to his feet, unsure whether or not his eyes were deceiving him. The figure glaring back at them was about the same size as Meat, and appeared to be wearing the same shorts Meat usually wore, but he had nothing else in common with Kid's minute manager. This man was covered in some sort of waxy body-paint, he was not wearing glasses as Meat usually did nor was he wearing a Kinniku mask. His features were small and sharp, and he had an unexpectedly thick head of black hair, that spiked out in every direction.

"Meat?" Kevin said cautiously.

The man growled a little, tightening his grip on the makeshift spear he was brandishing in one hand.

"Meat, it's us!" Kid called to him. "Mantaro and Kevin, remember?"

"I got breakfast," the man answered, lifting up his other hand to reveal three dead birds.

"He sounds like Meat…" Kevin mused.

"It is Meat!" Kid hissed, cowering behind Kevin. "He took off his mask and cloak and then he started wiping that tar stuff all over himself. He called me Suguru and then he just disappeared!"

"You boys better eat up!" Meat said. "C'mon Prince, Robin."

"What?" Kevin snapped.

"C'mon Robin," Meat said again.

"You bastard!" Kevin yelled, his voice loud enough to wake the others.

"What in tarnation's goin' on?" Terry moaned, pushing himself up.

"What in the name of all that is holy…?" Dik Dik gasped, scrambling to his feet, his eyes staring at Meat.

"The little man has gone crazy," Kevin warned them. "You were right: he's got jungle fever, or something. He just called me Robin, the dirty bastard!"

"We have to get him out of here!" Wally insisted. "He obviously isn't well!"

"I hate to admit it, but the walrus is right," Kevin reluctantly agreed. "Everybody pack up and let's get the hell out of here."

"A-Are you gonna take Meat?" Kid asked cautiously.

"He's your responsibility," Kevin flatly replied.

"I knew you were gonna say that!" Kid whimpered.

With a long, over-dramatic sigh, Kid started towards Meat.

"Hey Suguru!" Meat greeted him as he drew near. "Start a fire and let's eat!"

Kid paused, eying over Meat's catch thoughtfully.

"Hey you guys?" he said slowly, looking back over his shoulder.

"Let's eat first," Terry agreed.

"Yeah," Wally agreed. "Maybe the smell of food will wake up that lazy bum."

Kevin looked down sharply, wondering who of the group could possibly have slept through the past few moments of shouting and scrambling about.

"Of course…" he groaned. "Get up, scarface!"

He kicked without restraint at Mars, who rolled over with a groan.

"Not today sweetheart, I gotta headache!" he muttered into the ground.

"Oh for the love of…" Kevin grumbled. "Somebody just start cooking, the smell will wake him up."

* * *

"You forgot, didn't you?"

Kevin shook his head, turning to Kid and eying him over contemptuously.

"Well…" he began defensively. "It's not like you remembered!"

"Dude, you're meant to be the leader of the Muscle League," Kid pointed out. "We were counting on you to get us back to the beach."

Kevin growled in frustration, kicking at a nearby tree. Jaeger and Terry yelped in alarm, dashing out of the way as the tree began to tip over towards them.

"You always was useless wid directions," Mars said.

"You're not helping!" Kevin told him. "Besides, how big can this island possibly be? If we just keep walking in this direction, we're bound to arrive back at a beach on one side of the island."

"What if it's the wrong beach?" Terry asked.

"And how about the fact that you've been telling us to "just keep walking this way" for the past five hours?" Dik Dik added.

"You don't know that it's been five hours!" Kevin snapped.

"You guys are all stupid," Kid grumbled.

"Hey, you're the dumbest ass here!" Mars yelled at him.

"Whatever," Kid sighed, walking over to a tree and grabbing hold of the trunk.

"What the devil are you doing now?" Kevin sneered at him.

"I'm doing what you should have done back at camp," Kid sarcastically replied. "I'm finding out exactly where we are."

Kevin opened his mouth to remind Kid Muscle that he was an idiot; but as Kid began to climb a nearby tree, Kevin fell silent, looking about himself. Kid had, surprisingly, shown some initiative by choosing to climb the tallest tree in the area, which was most likely to give him a better vantage point across the treetops.

"Well fuck me," Mars grunted. "Da idiot maybe ain't so dumb after all."

"Hey Suguru, whatcha doin'?" Meat yelled after him.

The others all turned to Meat, looking him over warily. He had become consistently less lucid with every passing hour and yet his physical health seemed to be improving.

"Hey Kid, can ya see anythin'?" Terry called up to Kid as he neared the top of the tree.

Kid slipped a little as the branches thinned and became unable to support his weight. He quickly corrected himself and stabilised his position before looking all around.

"There's a volcano over that way," he shouted down, pointing in the direction Kevin had suggested they walk.

"Well I guess we won't be going that way then," Dik Dik muttered, thinning his eyes at Kevin.

"The trees get thinner this way," Kid added, pointing in another direction. "But I think we came from that direction."

Kid pointed in the opposite direction before climbing back down the tree.

"So vot do ve do?" Jaeger asked.

Kevin started as he suddenly found all eyes on him.

"Why are you all looking at me?" he asked.

"Because you're the leader?" Kid said sarcastically as he leapt off the tree. "I remember when I came in here before, the volcano was on the left side of the beach we were on if you looked towards the trees. That means the beach we came from is that way. But it looks like there's another beach this way that isn't too far from here. What should we do?"

Kevin took a deep breath to give his opinion on the matter, but shortly found himself sighing the air out again.

"Take a vote?" Mars offered.

"Yes," Kevin said. "Let's vote. But before we do, let's just consider what our options are. First of all, the journey back that way to the original beach will be a very long one and we probably won't make it back by nightfall. We left nothing of value back on the beach other than some rudimentary forms of shelter, but that wasn't anything that we can't easily rebuild. But we do know that Metaphor and Nakano hover over that beach and all the cameras and supplies seem to be based there. The journey to the other beach will be much quicker but we have no way of knowing if the cameras will find us there. Which is a good thing if we don't want to be filmed, but a bad thing if we don't want to starve to death."

"Dose damn cameras are everywhere," Mars said. "I vote we go da quickest way."

"Yeah, Meat really needs help," Kid agreed. "Let's got the quick way."

"I say the quick way," Terry said.

"Me too," Jaeger said.

"I agree," Wally said.

"I don't!" Dik Dik moaned. "I spent hours carving plates from old coconut shells and creating spears from trees branches!"

Kevin looked around the others before slapping a hand onto Dik Dik's shoulder.

"Sorry Bambi, you've been out-voted," he said. "I agree with the others too, let's just get out of here as quickly as possible."

Dik Dik muttered out some illegible curses, kicking at the undergrowth as the group started in the direction Kid had indicated the closest beach was. He turned to follow after the others, screaming and recoiling in shock as he found Meat standing in his path, grinning up at him maniacally. He was still not yet accustomed to seeing Kid's diminutive manager without his mask and looking so deranged; he had somehow always expected Meat to be really old, and was surprised to find him looking only about ten years older than Kid himself.

"Hi," Dik Dik said warily.

"Meat, c'mon!" Kid called back to him.

Meat spun around and waved at Kid, taking off after him, leaving Dik Dik to sigh in relief. After all, he was not sure he could have sustained a conversation with the new and bizarre Meat.

* * *

"Broken Junior."

"No. Jaeger."

"Huh?"

"Jaeger. Jae-ger. Jaeger."

"Suguru, you ain't makin' much sense."

"And I'm not Suguru. I'm Mantaro. Man-ta-ro."

"What kinda name is Mantaro?"

Kid sighed, rolling his eyes.

"Dude, that is exactly what I said to my dad too," he said. "I totally told him the name sucks. He said it's like Ultraman Taro without the Ultra, but what kinda lame way is that to name a kid? But it does grow on you. I don't mind it so much now."

"Mayumi?"

"No Meat, you're going back another generation now."

"Mayumi is your real father, Suguru! You're the prince of Muscle Planet, remember?"

Kid sighed, dropping his head into his hands. A short distance from where he sat on the beach with Meat, Dik Dik was sharpening some sticks, Wally, Terry and Jaeger were wading in the surf looking for anything edible, Kevin was adding wood to a fire they had built upon arriving at the beach and Mars was sat on a rock by the edge of the trees, hunched over something, his face creased with concerned concentration.

Once Kevin had deposited the firewood he approached Mars, the look on his friend's face finally getting the better of his curiosity.

"What gives?"

Mars looked up sharply, frowning at Kevin for a moment before breaking into a grin.

"Dat's my line," he said.

"What's this?" Kevin asked, snatching the crumpled item from Mars's hands.

"Hey, give dat back!" Mars snapped, grabbing at Kevin's hands in an attempt to retrieve it.

Kevin pushed him back with one hand and stood up to inspect what he had recovered, more than a little alarmed when he realised just what it was.

"Mars, what is wrong with you?" he said, rounding on Mars.

Mars dropped his hands to his side and slouched his shoulders in defeat.

"You don't understand how much dis means to me," he muttered.

"Clearly not!" Kevin said, slapping at the item he held. "This is the work of a very, very sick man, Mars!"

"Den I guess I'ma sick man, now give it back, you son of a bitch!"

Mars stood up and grabbed for his precious item, but again Kevin was able to thwart his attempt with one hand whilst pulling the item further from his reach with the other.

"It's my understanding Mars that we only got a limited supply of first-aid equipment with the toiletries," Kevin said slowly. "So then why the fuck did you waste yours on this?"

Kevin held up his hands, by now having attracted the attention of all the others, who all edged closer to Mars's back to see what had caused the ruckus in the first place.

"Is that's Checkmate's note?" Dik Dik asked.

"I thought we tore it apart!" Terry said, scratching at his head.

"You did!" Kevin said. "But this idiot stuck it back together using a roll of transparent medical tape!"

"Dude!" Kid yelped, eying Mars over.

"Yous can all kiss my ass!" Mars growled over his shoulder. "I don't care what yous thinka me. Gimme da damn note back, Mask!"

Mars held out his hand towards Kevin, casting him a warning look.

"Oh my…" Kevin began in a tone of disgust. "I don't believe it! You want this note to be for you! You want this! You actually, actually want this!"

"Hey, last time I checked, you ain't no mind reader!" Mars sneered. "Gimme da note back and shut da hell up!"

"Why would you want this?" Kevin asked, closing his fists around the reconstructed note. "Are you insane? Did you not listen to what I was trying to tell you the day before yesterday?"

"I was listenin', but I–"

Mars halted as something suddenly clanged against Kevin's mask and he staggered a little from the shock, his fingers opening and the note fluttering towards the ground. Mars hurriedly snatched back the note and stuffed it down his shorts before bending down to retrieve the latest rock to land on the island.

"Hey, I guess they caught up to us!" Terry said.

"Gimme that!" Kevin snapped irritably, snatching the rock from Mars and roughly pulling the attached note from it. "Kevin Mask, in your absence, the vote for eviction was held at the IWF headquarters, and Kid Muscle and Wally Tusket were nominated. The fans voted on these two, and the result has just come in: the next contestant to leave the island will be Wally Tusket."

"What?" Wally echoed. "The fans voted me to leave over Kid Muscle?"

"Of course!" Kid said with a shrug. "The fans don't want me to leave this island, they love me."

"It is odd," Kevin said in a low voice.

"Not really," Kid said, folding his arms and turning his head from Kevin.

"There's a lot of odd things going on around here though," Dik Dik said. "But in the meantime Wally, lucky you, here comes your helicopter already."

"Wait you guys, I don't want to go!"

The others all turned to Wally, glaring at him as though he had just gone insane.

"I have a better idea," he said. "I think someone else should go in my place."

"Wally, buddy!" Terry cried. "You're lettin' me go home for ma weddin'?"

Wally slowly shook his head.

"Sorry Terry, no," he said gently. "I think we should send Meat back instead of me. He really needs to go home much more than I do."

The others all turned to Meat, who was no less crazed than before.

"Still growin' your hair, huh Robin?" he said, pointing at Kevin.

"You're right," Kevin said to Wally. "You stay here, get this little shit on the next flight out of here."

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The team are set a new task to determine their food rationing for the next week on the island, and although Kevin is initially disgusted by the nature of the task, hope starts to shine as Kid Muscle confesses to being proficient at the required skill to complete the task. Back at HQ, Jacqueline finds herself stuck alone with one of her least favourite people and Trixie begins the countdown to her wedding. **Chapter 11 – Deaf and Dumber**.


	11. Deaf and Dumber

**Recap: **Jacqueline made the girls vote for who should leave the island next, which resulted in Wally being voted off. Wally offered to send Meat back in his place since Meat seemed to be worse than ever.

* * *

**Chapter 11 – Deaf and Dumber**

Kid clenched his fists at his sides, the look of focussed determination returning to his face. Kevin was beginning to wonder if coming to the island was actually turning out to be a good thing for Kid Muscle, since he appeared to be learning and growing from the experience. Looking down at Kid's feet, Kevin saw Meat sat sieving sand through his fingers, watching the sand fall with unnatural fascination. Kevin sighed softly and clapped a hand onto Kid's shoulder.

"I'm sorry," he said.

Kid's eyes shifted to Kevin, watching him from the corner of his eye.

"Me too," Kid said quietly. "I can't believe the IWF wouldn't let Meat go. He broke the rules of their show by coming here, I thought they would have taken him away."

"I think he'll be alright," Kevin lied, gripping his fingers into Kid's shoulder in what he hoped was a reassuring gesture. "We'll all look out for him, just like he's always done for us."

Kid smiled and turned his head a little towards Kevin.

"Thanks Kev, that means a lot coming from you," he said.

"I'm not a completely heartless bastard," Kevin reminded him, removing his hand from Kid's shoulder.

"I guess not completely, no."

Kevin pulled a face of offended surprise at Kid, who of course missed the gesture as Kevin was wearing his mask.

"I guess you do sometimes do nice things," Kid continued, oblivious to Kevin's increasing ire. "Like that time you went back to the DMP hide-out and beat up your little brother to save that Estonian guy called Jenny."

"What the bloody hell are you blabbering on about now?" Kevin echoed. "Oh no, is that jungle fever infectious? Stay the hell away from me!"

Kevin pulled his T-shirt up over his face, tucking the collar into the eyehole of his mask and he backed away from Kid. Perhaps he had been wrong after all: perhaps Kid Muscle was not actually becoming more resourceful, but rather he had contracted the odd illness Meat appeared to be suffering from, making him act out of character.

Kevin continued backing up until his booted ankles hit a rock and he almost fell over backwards. There he stopped, slowly looking around the remaining company on the island. Meat was clearly deranged with no signs of recovering any time soon. Kid Muscle seemed to be heading the same way as his manager – and even if there was nothing wrong with him, he was still Kid Muscle, the irritating, flatulent, tactless, endless pest. Dik Dik Van Dik had become a little too obsessive about manufacturing crockery out of wood and coconut shells, and for some reason kept stopping and looking down over his shoulder as though he thought something was crawling up his back – which was starting to really worry Kevin. Jaeger was starting to have some serious identity issues since Meat had called him Broken Junior, largely involving him randomly chopping down trees with his Red Rain of Pain, which was a pretty dangerous habit for a man teetering on the edge of sanity to adopt. Terry had taken the sport of hunting the fish and birds on the island to another level by muttering out his own nature-documentary-style commentary as he crept around the island chasing after the creatures that usually successfully eluded him thanks to his less-than-quiet approach. Mars was still clinging to Checkmate's note, treating the soggy, torn and badly repaired piece of paper as though it were in fact his own child.

Kevin concluded that they had all gone mad. He had managed to maintain his dignity on the island, but the others had lost it. He was still sane, he had not said or done anything regrettable on or off-camera, and apparently he would have to continue to stay strong to guide the others through their remaining time on the island. Kevin sighed, planting his hands on his hips, the idea that he was forgetting about something slowly dawning on him.

Kevin looked down at himself. He was wearing his mask, the stupid T-shirt Kid Muscle had made for him, his brown leather gloves, his Union Jack boxer shorts and his knee-high black leather boots.

Kevin cleared his throat awkwardly. Alright, he conceded, so perhaps he looked a little eccentric himself; but unlike the others, his eccentricity was only skin-deep. He had not developed any odd habits, said or done anything stupid and he was not succumbing to any of the trials of island life.

Meat, Kid, Dik Dik, Jaeger, Terry and even Mars all snapped around in shock at the sound of Kevin Mask yelling out an entirely unrepeatable trio of curse words. They all stared at him with wide eyes until he began to sweat and muttered out an apology, bending down to retrieve the rock that had just bounced off of his iron mask, leaving it ringing loudly. He cleared his throat before reading the latest note.

"Kevin Mask, tomorrow is task day. Food rations for the next week will be decided based on your success at the task set. As before, you must agree an amount of food to gamble on the completion of this task before sundown tonight. The task will begin at dawn tomorrow. This week your task is Musical Be…"

The others leaned forwards expectantly, watching as Kevin's eyes flicked repeatedly over the note before he finally turned the note over, examining the blank side for a moment before turning it back again.

"Musical chairs?" Terry asked.

"No," Kevin said with a sigh. "Musical chairs is a silly game for children, and therefore far too sensible and reasonable for that psychotic McMadd woman. Before sundown tomorrow, we have to nominate one representative, who will be given two minutes to burp the national anthem of each of the remaining contestants, in this case, Japan, America, Britain, Italy, Germany and Tanzania."

"They want us to do what?" Dik Dik echoed.

"Burp the national anthem of Japan, America, Britain, Italy, Germany and Tanzania in less than two minutes," Kevin repeated.

"Are you serious?" Kid Muscle asked, walking over to Kevin. "Lemme see that!"

Kid took the note from Kevin and read it over.

"I don't believe this…" he muttered.

"Believe it," Kevin grumbled.

"This is so awesome!" Kid cried, punching a fist into the air.

"What?" Kevin yelped.

"Dude! This is like the easiest task we've ever been given! I could do this no sweat."

"I'm sure you probably could, but… Wait… What?"

"Well, I already know what all those songs sound like, and I'm really good at burp-talking, so I think I could burp-sing all six songs in two minutes."

"You could… What?"

Terry hurried over, placing himself between Kid and Kevin.

"Kevin, Kid's right!" he said cheerfully. "We can win this thing! Kid may be tone-deaf, but he can burp just about any tune you can think of!"

"You say that like it's a good thing…" Kevin grumbled.

"Well, usually it's a kinda gross thing," Terry agreed.

"But in this case, it's a skill that is going to save our asses," Dik Dik said, looking a little disgusted with himself for admitting as much.

"Gamble all da food!" Mars called over, punching a fist into the air. "I've heard dat bastard burp, we got nothin' to lose!"

Kevin slowly looked around the others, silently deciding that losing the gamble and being without food for a week would probably do little more to affect their sanity, which had already apparently slipped, and so there was no real harm in gambling their entire ration.

"Fine," he said with a shrug. "McMadd, we want to gamble one hundred percent, and we choose Kid Muscle to do the task."

Kevin ducked and dodged to one side as a particularly large rock fell to the sand, narrowly missing him.

"It says "confirmed"," Kid informed the others as he pulled the note from the rock to read the rest of the message. "And it says "if you lose, you will be given no food supplies for the next week, but if you win, you will receive double rations". Cool!"

The others began cheering and dancing about happily in the evening light. Kevin allowed himself to relax a little as he saw their excitement, hoping that they would all start acting a little more sensibly after a good feed the following evening.

"Hey you guys, there's more!" Kid called out, turning the note over. "When we're ready, there's a video message for us from Wally!"

The others all hurried over and began yelling at Kevin to talk to the rocks, leading him to think that perhaps they were still a long way from recovering their sanity just yet.

"We're ready for the video!" he yelled at the sky, pushing back Mars and Dik Dik, who had been the most forceful.

The green sphere carrying Doc and Mac lowered to the sand and slowly buzzed open, revealing the colour commentators looking even more haggard than before. Mac waved at them without focusing his eyes on anyone in particular, his face dull and expressionless, and Doc pressed a button on his console with one hand, pointing over his shoulder with the other. The screen behind them flickered to life, a picture of Wally standing in a studio emblazoned with the IWF logo and the title of the show appearing.

"Hi guys!" he said cheerfully. "I'm back at the IWF headquarters, and everybody is here, and they're all really excited to have me back. We all can't wait for the rest of you guys to join us for a big party!"

"Get to da point!" Mars barked impatiently, grabbing the sphere and shaking it a little, causing Doc and Mac to loll back and forth.

"He can't hear you, you twat," Kevin muttered.

"Hey, Amy told me what dat word really means, you cheeky son of a bitch!" Mars rounded on Kevin, pointing a finger at his masked face.

"Well you are one," Kevin replied with a shrug.

"Just shut-up and let Wally talk!"

Kevin started to tell Mars that Wally's message was pre-recorded, but the slightly crazed glint in Mars's golden eyes made him stop himself, lest his friend lose his temper and really become a handful once more.

"Since arriving back here, I've discovered that one of the girls here really is pregnant," Wally continued. "And the father really is one of you guys! That's right: it wasn't me. It isn't Meat, either."

Wally winked at the camera and then began to wave.

"Good luck with the rest of the show guys!"

Everyone except Kevin began arguing about the stupidity of Wally's message. Kevin watched in silence as the sphere closed over and rose into the air again before turning to the others, who had, by then, begun fighting with each other. He groaned, finding himself without the motivation to jump into the melee to pull them all apart.

"Hey Robin, ain't ya joinin' in the sparrin' session?"

Kevin looked downwards, finding Meat loitering by his ankles, grinning wildly up at him.

"If you call me Robin one more time, I will–"

"Hey Kev?"

Kevin turned from Meat, finding Kid Muscle hopping out of the ruckus and stumbling towards him.

"What is it?" Kevin asked him.

"I'm confused…"

Kevin looked down at the object in Kid's hands that he was frowning at, a sickening feeling of panic rising in his chest as he saw that it was the details of the following day's task.

"Why?" Kevin asked, his eyes snapping back to Kid's dopey face.

"Well, which national anthem of Britain should I be burping tomorrow?"

Kevin stopped himself from lunging at Kid and strangling the life from him; though he did allow the image of doing so to linger in his mind's eye.

"The national anthem of Britain," he said carefully.

"Yeah, but which one?" Kid asked. "Is it the one that goes na-na na-na, na-na na-na, na-na na na na-na?"

"That's Beethoven's Ninth, you idiot!" Kevin snapped. "Please tell me you are joking here! Please tell me that you do actually know what the real national anthems of all these countries are and how to sing-how to burp them?"

"I just can't remember which ones are the right ones."

"_God Save the Queen_!"

"Whoa dude, calm down! No need to swear at me! I'm trying to remember here!"

"No you gigantic fool, _God Save the Queen_ is the national anthem of Britain!"

"It is? Really? Oh, I didn't know that was what they called it…"

Kevin drew in a deep breath, hurriedly checking that the others, particularly the food-obsessed Mars, were still preoccupied before continuing.

"Sing it for me, I want to be absolutely sure that you know what it is," he said.

"Oh okay," Kid agreed with a shrug. "Friday night and the lights are low!"

"What?"

"Looking out for the place to go."

"Please tell me this is a joke…"

"Where they play the right music, getting in the swing, you come in to look for a king!"

"That's _Dancing Queen_, not _God Save the Queen_!"

"Are you sure?"

"Yes!"

"Oh… Oh wait! I've got it!"

"Thank goodness for that…"

"Mamma, just killed a man. Put a gun against his head, pulled my trigger now he's dead. Mamma, life had just begun, but now I've gone and thr–"

"That's _Bohemian Rhapsody_ by Queen!"

"Dude, you're really good at this game!"

"This is not a fucking game!"

Kevin's outburst brought the others to a halt and they all turned in his direction with questioning looks.

"This idiot, who just told us all he could do the task, who we just gambled all of our food supplies for the next week on, doesn't know what the national anthem of Great Britain is!" Kevin told them.

"Of course I do!" Kid defended himself. "I just don't know which one to use, that's all."

"Kid, there ain't more than one national anthem for Great Britain!" Terry pointed out. "Do ya know what the American national anthem is?"

"Aw come on dude, everybody knows that one! That's so easy!"

Terry folded his arms and thinned his eyes at Kid.

"Sing it for me," he said darkly.

"Sure!" Kid said cheerfully. "Twinkle, twinkle, little star!"

"That ain't a national anthem, that's a dang nursery rhyme!" Terry yelled.

"It's something about stars though, right?" Kid responded.

"What about Italy?" Mars asked. "Can ya remember dat one?"

"That's super easy!" Kid replied. "When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie–"

"You son of a bitch, you'll starve us all to death!" Mars roared. "I'll eat your sorry ass before I'll lay down an' die like a dog!"

"Zhis is crazy!" Jaeger cried. "Kid, surely you know ze German national anthem, ja?"

"Uh…" Kid began slowly. "Oh yeah! Watching every motion, in my foolish lover's game. On this endless ocean, finally lovers know no shame."

"That's _Take my Breath_ _Away_ by Berlin!" Kevin snapped.

"I was close though. Berlin is the same thing as Germany, right?" Kid muttered moodily.

"What about Tanzania, Kid?" Dik Dik asked.

"Uh… In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleep tonight!"

"You dirty, dirty bastard!" Dik Dik cursed in a low voice.

"Do you even know what the national anthem of Japan sounds like?" Kevin demanded.

"Well, I was the Japanese delegate in the Chojin Crown!" Kid sarcastically replied. "So yeah, I think I know what the Japanese national anthem sounds like!"

"Sing it," Kevin growled.

"Fine!" Kid agreed.

Kid began singing in a falsetto voice whilst batting his eyelids.

"That's _Dearest_ by Ayumi Hamasaki," Kevin corrected him. "Try again."

Kid tried again, and again Kevin felt his confidence wane.

"That's _Shinjitsu no Uta_ by Do As Infinity," Kevin said with a sigh.

"Well what about that one that goes do-do do-doo, do-do do-doo, do-do-do-do-do-do-do?"

"_Turning Japanese_ by Vapors?"

"Damn!"

Kevin sighed, hanging his head in defeat.

"Hey Kev?" Terry called to him.

"What now?" Kevin asked, looking up at him.

"You sure gotta lotta music knowledge goin' on there," Terry said slowly. "Maybe you oughta do tomorrow's task."

"Excuse me but unlike everybody else on this island, I am not an animal!" Kevin tightly replied. "I do not belch. I most especially do not belch melodically!"

"Den maybe we oughta just eat your stuffy ass…" Mars muttered.

"I heard that, bat features!" Kevin sneered.

Mars grumbled something else out that was entirely illegible to the others.

"You can stick it there yourself, you cheeky shit," Kevin said.

"You wasn't meant to hear dat," Mars muttered.

Kevin sighed, rolling his eyes.

"So basically, we're fucked," he concluded. "We have less than 24 hours to teach this pig-faced idiot how to belch out our national anthems and his own, which, if it was not embarrassing enough, will most likely then be followed by the entire world watching us starve to death over the next week."

"I thought you done said you didn't need no food," Terry muttered.

"I was thinking about you, you fat bastard!" Kevin snapped.

"Screw you asshole, I ain't fat!" Terry yelled back.

"You have kinda let yourself go though," Kid said to Terry. "Ever since you lost out getting into the Chojin Crown. You were totally out of breath the whole way through the Bad Blood Tournament."

Jaeger and Dik Dik nodded their agreement, only further irking Terry.

"Oh yeah?" Terry growled at them. "Well at least I ain't growing cotton outta my ass!"

"No!" Dik Dik screamed, running off and consistently looking over each shoulder in turn as he went.

"What the hell was that?" Kevin asked anyone who cared to listen.

"I told him he was growin' a tail," Mars said, grinning slowly. "And da dumb asshole believed me!"

Kid, Terry, Mars and Jaeger became to chuckle to themselves, but Kevin merely watched them wondering how a normally sensible man like Dik Dik could have been so easily fooled, and, more importantly, why he was the only one not in on the joke.

* * *

Wally sat down quietly into a folding chair facing the stage. The set was in darkness, but he recognised it as the one he, Kid, Terry and Dik Dik had appeared on at the start of Generation Ex Tournament when they had been required to choose their opponents for their first round matches. He was not really sure why, but it was amongst the seating there that he had finally found his younger sister. She had not acknowledged him as he climbed the steps between the seats and so he had decided to sit down behind her and wait for her to talk to him when she was ready; though he was beginning to grow concerned that she was sulking with him for some reason or another as she had not greeted him when he had returned from the desert island.

"Are you still mad at me?" she eventually said, lifting her head but not turning around.

Wally frowned at the back of her head curiously.

"I'm not mad at you Dorothy," he said gently. "Why would I be?"

"Well, you know…" she said with a shrug. "I was always chasing after Mantaro, and then Check… Mate…"

"That's okay," Wally assured her. "I'm not mad at you, but I was mad at Kid and Checkmate. It's fine now though."

"Good," Dorothy said with a nod of her head. "I'm glad you're back. It's been really crazy in here!"

Dorothy turned in her seat to smile up at her elder brother.

"Can you believe it?" she asked him.

"Which part?" he asked with a small chuckle. "The bit about the Kinniku family's big event, the reason Terry's wedding had to be so soon, Kiki's surprise or Amy's secret?"

Dorothy laughed.

"All of them I guess!"

Wally laughed with her, although he could not fully enjoy the merriment. In the back of his mind he was slowly considering each of the four things he had learned since returning to the IWF headquarters, four things none of the participants on the island knew, and four things he had no idea how to tell any of them. Wally shortly found his laughter fading as he considered what he had seen upon his arrival back: Jacqueline had not been bluffing, and Checkmate's note had not been a fake. There really was a baby on the way, and, as he thought about the prospective parents with their child, Wally could not help but give a small shudder.

* * *

"Good morning fans!"

"Welcome to day ten of _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_!"

"Today is task day again, and Doc, what is the task for today?"

"I don't really give a damn any more Mac. I think it's something about farting in a can."

"Farting in a can Doc? Isn't it pissing in the ocean?"

"No, that's a metaphor."

"Isn't it an analogy?"

"Aren't they the same thing?"

"I don't know, Doc."

"Let's forget the ocean and consider the bigger issue here today Mac. Have you managed to unscramble the porn channel yet?"

Jacqueline growled, punching her fist into the desk in front of her.

"Remind me to fire those two useless asses," she growled.

"I think they're quite funny," Ikeman said to her.

"What are you doing in here?" Jacqueline snapped at her.

"Oh, I came to tell you that everyone has gone," Ikeman replied.

"What do you mean "everyone has gone"?"

"I mean everyone has gone."

Jacqueline snarled out some curse words through a prolonged sigh, pinching at the bridge of her nose as she tried to stave off a migraine.

"For Terry Kenyon and Trixie Maekawa's wedding," Ikeman added.

Jacqueline turned sharply to her brother, her face twisting in confusion.

"For what?" she asked. "I mean… What? How can there be a wedding when the groom is still in on a desert island?"

Ikeman shrugged, which only served to irritate Jacqueline further.

"Well at least if they've all gone to America I can get some peace," she said with a sigh, casting an eye over the wall of screens at her side displaying the current events on the island.

Jacqueline turned around again expecting to see her brother still standing there; but the sight that greeted her instead made her yelp in shock.

"What the hell are you doing in here?" she squealed, pressing a hand to her chest as she tried to slow her suddenly pounding heart.

"I wasn't invited to the wedding, and right now, I really don't have anywhere else to go, so I'm going to stay here, at your expense, until you let those men off that island."

Jacqueline started to smile, preparing herself to deliver a witty and cutting retort; but the grave and intense look on Amy's face as she glared back at her made her stop.

"You know, you don't have to stay right here, in the studio," Jacqueline said slowly. "You could just­ go–"

"Yes I do," Amy cut her off. "I'm going to stay right here, in the studio, for as long as it takes for this crap to end. Partly because I have nowhere else to go, but mostly because I know how much it's going to annoy you."

Jacqueline started to laugh, but again stopped when the look on Amy's face remained unchanged.

"Well at least now I finally understand why you and Kevin Mask are a couple…" she grumbled. "Look, if you stay out of my way, I'll stay out of yours. How about that?"

"Not going to happen."

Jacqueline sighed again, resisting the urge to pull at her hair in frustration. Her idea for a reality show had seemed flawless just ten days earlier, but it was rapidly turning into a living hell for her. The only positive she could still see was that the show was still earning exceptionally high ratings, and the IWF board of directors were still impressed with the results she had achieved. She just had to keep it up a little longer, and the chair of the IWF would be hers for certain.

Jacqueline moved her eyes back to the doorway, finding Amy still standing there, still staring at her, the expression on her face still the same.

It was going to be a long day.

* * *

Roxanne and Kiki stared at each other with wide eyes as each tried to communicate with their own unique brand of sign language. They continued to confuse each other until they noticed that Trixie had turned around and was staring at them both.

"Trixie!" Roxanne said cheerfully. "How are you doing?"

"You both think I'm crazy," she replied.

"What?" Kiki yelped.

"No!" Roxanne said. "We don't… We don't think that!"

"Not at all!" Kiki added.

Trixie nodded her head and rolled her eyes.

"Don't lie, I know you do," she grumbled. "But I also don't really care. Tomorrow is my wedding day, and if Terry really does love me, he will be there to marry me."

Roxanne turned to Kiki and tilted her head, signing out a few shapes in the air that just made Kiki shrug her shoulders.

"Trixie, you've got to be realistic about this," Roxanne said with a sigh.

Kiki nodded her head, sensing that she understood Roxanne's earlier signing.

"Yeah Trixie," she said. "Terry is stranded on a desert island, there's no possible way he's gonna make it here by tomorrow morning for your wedding."

Roxanne turned back to Kiki abruptly, drawing her fingers back and forth across her throat and shaking her head violently.

"Huh?" Kiki whispered to her.

"What Kiki means is that there is a chance Terry might not make it tomorrow," Roxanne said, glowering at Kiki before turning to Trixie and adopting a sympathetic look.

Trixie shook her head, tears forming in her eyes.

"He has to make it," she said quietly. "He just has to. It can't be at any other time, it'll be too late if he makes me wait any longer."

"I know how you feel," Roxanne said gently, resting her hands on Trixie's shoulders. "But this might be the way that it has to be. I know it's hard, but you have to prepare yourself, because you might not be marrying Terry Kenyon tomorrow morning."

Trixie lowered her head, a small sob escaping her as she did so.

"But it's not the end of the world, Trixie!" Kiki hurriedly added. "It's not like you can't ever marry Terry! It's just that now things will be a little… Different…"

Trixie slowly shook her head.

"Neither of you understand," she said quietly. "If I can't get married tomorrow, my wedding will never be perfect, like I always hoped that it would be. If I have to wait longer, the day will be ruined because of…"

Roxanne and Kiki gasped quietly and Trixie spun around, turning her back to them and sobbing into her hand. Roxanne and Kiki turned to each other exchanging looks of concern for their friend for a moment before Roxanne smiled and clapped her hands together.

"Let's watch the show!" she said. "Kid's doing the task today, remember?"

"You said we shouldn't watch the show any more," Kiki reminded her.

"And the last we saw, it looked like Kid was gonna mess up the task today," Trixie added, peering over her shoulder through a curtain of hair at Roxanne.

"Exactly!" Roxanne said cheerfully. "Don't you see? Once Kid messes up the task and the guys are without food, the IWF will eventually have to get them off the island! They can't last without food, and the IWF can't afford to let them starve!"

"Hey, yeah!" Kiki agreed. "C'mon Trixie, let's watch the show!"

Kiki and Roxanne grabbed one of Trixie's arms each and turned her around, dragging her towards the nearest television set. Mari, Suguru, Terryman and Natsuko were already gathered around the screen, watching intently, and the girls had to push them aside to see what had captivated their attention so.

"Um… There's been a slight change of plan?"

Roxanne, Trixie and Kiki all tilted their heads to one side as they watched Kevin Mask clear his throat awkwardly before scratching at the back of his head – which was quite absurd an action as he was still wearing his iron mask.

"After much debate on the matter, we would like to nominate another representative to complete today's task," Kevin continued. "Will that be alright?"

There was a short pause before Doc Nakano announced that Kevin's request would be honoured.

"In that case Kid Muscle will not be completing today's task of "Musical Belchers"," Kevin said a little sadly. "I will be completing the task."

Roxanne, Trixie and Kiki all screamed out noises of shock and disbelief that Kevin had just nominated himself to belch the national anthems of six countries, but they quickly quietened down as Kevin began to follow through with completion of the task.

* * *

Amy narrowed her eyes, watching on the large television set as Kevin awkwardly burped his way through the German national anthem. He was making a bigger idiot of himself than apparently even he himself realised. She had never heard him burp, and had not actually thought that he even knew how to. But as he moved onto the American national anthem, Amy began to smile in spite of herself: if nothing else, she would always enjoy tormenting him about his musical gas when he returned from the island.

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The outcome of the task is not quite what anyone expected, and as the girls become emotional in Texas, the boys on the island begin to question their very existence as another discussion day arrives. **Chapter 12 – Wedding Veils and Fluffy Tails**.


	12. Wedding Veils and Fluffy Tails

**Recap: **After Kid failed to remember the "correct" national anthems for the task, Kevin was forced to take over completing the task. Back in the studio Jacqueline began to feel the pressures of running the show and in Texas the girls continued preparations for Terry and Trixie's wedding, even though it seemed unlikely that Terry would be there for the ceremony.

* * *

**Chapter 12 – Wedding Veils and Fluffy Tails**

"Ain't you gonna eat?"

"No, I don't think that I will."

"Huh? Why not?"

"Honestly? I'm too scared to eat."

"Scared? Of what?"

"Well, it took me two hours to stop the heart-burn and spontaneous "emissions" from… Both ends of my body… If I eat now, it might start all over again. I'm worried I might turn into a Kinniku."

Mars laughed shamelessly, spraying half-chewed food over Kevin's mask.

"I'm glad someone is enjoying this," Kevin grumbled.

"You gotta eat somethin', Kev!" Mars insisted, jabbing his plate against Kevin's chest.

Kevin looked down at it thoughtfully, before moving his eyes to the utensils in Mars's other hand.

"What is this silver service?" he muttered, pointing at the particularly sharp-looking knife Mars had.

"No, it's bamboo service," Mars solemnly replied.

"Oh, ha ha ha ha!" Kevin sneered. "That's so funny! Ha ha ha – oh shit…"

Mars doubled over with laughter as Kevin's sarcastic laughter made him fart again.

"I think my gullet and my sphincter are repaying me for a lifetime of repression…" Kevin grumbled.

"Please stop," Mars begged, attempting to steady his plate as the contents began slipping to the sand.

"I'm serious, Mars," Kevin continued. "All my life I held it in. It's a part of my father's training I never really forgot."

"Your daddy trained you not to cut da cheese?"

"It's not becoming of a gentleman to belch or to… Fart."

"Are you serious? You seriously ain't never done dat before?"

Kevin slowly shook his head. Mars eyed him questioningly for a moment before placing down his plate onto a nearby rock and grabbing Kevin's mask in both hands. Before Kevin could complete a yelp of complaint, Mars had lifted the mask up, exposing Kevin's face from the eyebrows down. Mars's eyes widened a little as he saw that, after his initial indignation at being unmasked, Kevin looked pale, sickened and a little afraid.

"Holy shit, Kev!" he concluded, pulling Kevin's mask back down. "You just never stop gettin' any weirder."

"Thanks, mate…" Kevin muttered.

Mars shrugged, grabbing up his plate again and stuffing more food into his mouth. Kevin rolled his eyes and shook his head in despair, before slowly looking around the others, who were all sat around a fire, gladly gorging themselves on the double rations of food they had earned after Kevin had successfully burped his way through samples of six national anthems in less than two minutes. Other than Kid Muscle looking scruffier and Meat looking a little more detached from reality, the gang looked reasonably sensible and happy.

But Kevin knew only too well that their current predicament would not last long.

"It's all going to go wrong," he said aloud.

"Huh?" Mars asked him.

"This," Kevin said, holding out a hand towards the group ahead of them. "It isn't going to last. I just have this feeling that before long, we're all going to be beating the crap out of each other over some meaningless piece of nonsense again, or else we'll be trying to coach the little man down from a tree after he starts thinking he's turned into an ape."

"Don't be such a killjoy, Kev!" Mars said, shaking his head with a frown. "We got double food for da next week, we don't gotta worry about nothin' now 'til dey do da next eviction."

"I disagree."

"Ah, lighten up. I'm sure your daddy'll forgive ya for burpin' and fartin' on TV."

"I don't care what he thinks, I was just…"

Kevin's voice faded as the sickening idea that it had not just been those present on the island and Jacqueline McMadd that had heard him burp-singing.

"I really hate this life," he groaned. "Everyday I find another reason why I never should have left the DMP…"

* * *

"This is fun!"

Roxanne glared at Kiki, who shrank back a little and shrugged her shoulders.

"I think it's fun!" she said defensively.

"It sucks," Trixie said bluntly. "Just admit it. I know you all think that it sucks. I think that it sucks."

"It's not that bad, Trixie!" Roxanne assured her. "We're just all really anxious about tomorrow."

"The night before your wedding rocked," Trixie said with a sigh. "Those were the days when we liked Jacqueline. Before she became a total bitch."

"Um, excuse me, but she was a total bitch before Roxanne's wedding!" Kiki pointed out. "Look at what she did to Mars and Kid during the Chojin Crown?"

"I guess," Trixie agreed.

"And hey, at least this party is more fun than the one the boys are having on that island!" Roxanne giggled.

"I think they're having fun right now," Trixie said flatly. "Kevin losing control of his gas, Meat going nuts and Dik Dik making crockery and looking for his new tail is pretty funny."

"Yeah!" Kiki agreed. "I kinda wish I could have been there today, just to actually see Kevin do that task and then tease him about it afterwards. And I think I'd really enjoy asking Dik Dik about his fluffy tail!"

Trixie and Kiki laughed at the idea, but Roxanne frowned, tilting her head a little.

"Hey, that's my phone!" she yelped suddenly, grabbing at her jean pocket.

"Who is it?" Trixie asked as Roxanne produced her phone.

"It's a text," Roxanne replied, flipping open her phone. "From Amy… She says: "hope this reaches you before Trixie's wedding. Go to nearest bookstore and look out for the new reason books. Thinking about suing, care to join me?""

Roxanne looked over her phone at Trixie, who looked as confused as she felt. Kiki however let out a squeaky gasp, her face turning pale.

"Oh no!" she wailed. "Not again!"

"What is it?" Trixie asked her.

"Well it sounds like Jacqueline McMadd is releasing more books, like she did during the Chojin Crown," Kiki explained.

"Oh crap, no!" Roxanne growled, snapping her phone shut. "Not another dumb book full of inaccurate and deeply personal facts about Kid and me?"

"There's only one way to find out for sure," Trixie said flatly.

She finished her drink and hopped off the barstool.

"C'mon girls, let's go," she concluded.

Roxanne and Kiki nodded, finishing their drinks before hurrying after her.

* * *

"Hatred, Dishonour and Vengeance?"

Amy arched her eyebrows expectantly at Jacqueline McMadd.

"I've mixed it up a little," she explained.

"So I see," Amy said.

"During the Jacqueline McMadd Chojin Crown, I used the phrase "Love, Honour and Redemption"," Jacqueline continued.

"How could I forget?"

"Kid Muscle was Love, Kevin Mask was Honour and Mars was Redemption. Kid Muscle was fighting to win the Chojin Crown so that he could marry his love, Roxanne. Kevin Mask was fighting to win the Chojin Crown for the honour of being the best. Mars was fighting to win the Chojin Crown because if he won, he would guarantee himself a place in the Muscle League, the ultimate redemption for a former DMP monster."

"Indeed."

"But this time it's all about "Hatred, Dishonour and Vengeance". Mars is full of hate, Kevin is dishonouring himself every day and Kid is seeking vengeance for all those times the others have treated him badly."

"Sure."

"The baby angle was gold, but with these books, I can take it to another level. This will be platinum by comparison."

"The baby angle?"

"Viewing figures soared when that information was "leaked" to the island."

"But it's not just some stupid part of your stupid show. There really is a baby on the way."

"Well, according to Kevin Mask, there's a raving monster on the way, readying himself to tear his way out of his mother in a few months' time."

"That's pleasant."

"I don't need to be pleasant. I'm not the idiot who got pregnant by a Chojin."

"Again, that's a nice sentiment."

"Sentimentality is for the weak."

Amy slowly ran her eyes over Jacqueline before letting out a sigh.

"Sometimes I wonder why things didn't work out between you and Kevin," she concluded. "Sometimes it seems like the two of you are perfect for each other."

Jacqueline smiled sweetly, but Amy returned her gesture with a blank stare. Jacqueline groaned and rolled her eyes, turning back to the sets of proofs the IWF publishing house had sent to her. She did not have time to worry about what Amy was thinking, as she needed to pick the front covers for her new books.

* * *

"But why not?"

"Because I don't have the ingredients, I don't know how to, and it's a waste of time!"

"But why?"

"Because I can't do it!"

Terry quirked an eyebrow curiously at Kid Muscle and Dik Dik Van Dik, who were, apparently, still arguing about something by the fire. They had been arguing since the food rations arrived, and even though the sun had set long ago, their argument was still raging on.

"The hell is wrong with ya, Kid?" he asked, interrupting their bickering.

"It's not me, Terry!" Kid defended himself. "It's all Double-D's fault!"

"I told you not to call me that!" Dik Dik snapped at Kid. "And Terry, this is actually all Kid's fault," he added, turning to Terry. "He wants me to make cow and rice for him, but I don't have the ingredients. Also, I don't know how to make cow and rice."

"That's impossible, right Terry?" Kid asked Terry. "I mean, Big D has cooked all the food so far, so why can't he just make me some cow and rice?"

"Tell him I don't know how Terry!" Dik Dik insisted. "And tell him to stop calling me stupid names!"

"Terry, tell Dik Dik I'm sitting right here and I can hear what he's saying!"

"Terry, tell Kid Muscle what a pig he is!"

"Terry, tell Dik I don't like being called a pig!"

"Terry, tell Kid not to call me Dik like that, it sounds like he's saying dick!"

"Terry, tell Dik that–"

"Shut-up!"

Kid and Dik Dik clamped their mouths shut and their eyes grew wide as Terry growled at them menacingly.

"You're both so damn selfish!" he yelled. "I'm supposed to be gettin' married tomorrow, I don't wanna have to spend tonight listenin' to you fairies arguin' over home comforts! I gotta girl waitin' for me to take her down the aisle tomorrow morning, and I ain't gonna make it! I'm already itchin' to kick some ass, you two keep this up and the next damn task is gonna be recoverin' your bodies from the damn ocean!"

Terry stomped off, leaving Kid and Dik Dik staring after him in bemusement.

"Dude, you've really upset Terry," Kid said eventually, turning to Dik Dik.

"That wasn't my fault!" Dik Dik yelped defensively.

"Yeah, I think it was," Kid said, nodding his head. "Terry really doesn't like your new tail."

"What?" Dik Dik screamed, leaping to his feet and looking over both shoulders. "Damn it!"

He ran off, leaving Kid snorting into his hands in childish laughter. Jaeger and Mars, who had been watching the entire exchange, turned to each other and exchanged looks of exasperation.

"Zhis is so crazy," Jaeger said with a sigh. "Dik Dik has to go, he could hurt somebody!"

"Dik Dik?" Mars echoed. "Nah, we gotta get rid o' Kid next. He's da one causin' all da problems."

"Nein, ve should get rid of Dik Dik."

"Nein, ve should get rid o' Kid!"

"Are you mocking me?"

"Nein!"

Jaeger pounced at Mars and the two fell to the sand, rolling over and over each other.

"I'm stuck here with a bunch of arseholes," Kevin muttered.

"Hey Robin, how ya doin', buddy?"

Kevin lowered his eyes to Meat, who was, once again, at his ankles.

"A bunch of complete and utter arseholes," he concluded. "I'm the only sane and sensible one left on this God-forsaken island!"

Kevin enjoyed a brief moment of calm before yet another rock banged mercilessly off his mask. He turned to the nearest visible camera and told Jacqueline McMadd exactly what sort of woman he thought she was before turning back to find that Meat had already picked up the rock and begun removing the note.

"Gimme that!" Kevin demanded, swiping a hand at the note in Meat's tiny fist.

Meat pulled it out of his reach, arching his eyebrows at him as though daring him to attempt to retrieve it again.

"Alright then just tell me what it says!" Kevin said.

Meat cleared his throat, bringing the note round in front of his face.

"A long, long time ago, God made the Earth and all the creatures that live in it," he read.

"What?" Kevin grunted.

"He created the sky, the rivers, the animals, the humans and everything in between," Meat continued.

Kevin groaned, silently wondering why he had trusted a man gone crazy to sensibly read the note to him.

"Or perhaps he did not," Meat continued. "Perhaps the world was created in the Big Bang, and almighty creation of–"

"For fuck's sake, just give me the note little man!"

Kevin grabbed Meat's arm in one hand and yanked the note from him with the other. Meat growled angrily as him as he released him, looking down at the red imprint Kevin had left on his arm. Kevin slowly turned his hand over, moaning as he sighted the waxy paint on his palm where he had inadvertently touched Meat on a painted part of his arm. Wiping his hand on his terrible T-shirt, Kevin turned the note over and began reading.

"A long, long time ago, God made the Earth and all the creatures that live…"

Kevin lowered the note a little to peer over the top of it at Meat, who was still scowling angrily up at him.

"My apologies," he said quietly. "I had forgotten that even though you have gone completely insane, you are still, of course, more sensible than the McMadd family. Perhaps it's no mere coincidence that the word "mad" is in their name…"

Skimming through the lengthy note Kevin eventually reached the gist of it: the next day was to be discussion day again, and the topic of choice was suitably controversial and likely to cause yet more in-fighting; or at least a few more contestants to lose their minds.

* * *

Roxanne cleared her throat and hissed again, but still Kiki's eyes did not look her way. They had been standing at Trixie's side at the top of the altar for close to twenty minutes, and despite the fact that everyone else in the church was looking increasingly awkward and nervous, nobody had dared approach Trixie yet to remind her that _Chojin Desert Island Survivor_ was currently broadcasting live and that Terry was still on the island. It seemed that everybody was – understandably – afraid to speak the truth, and so, Roxanne concluded, it was up to her and Kiki to talk some sense into Trixie. But before she could do that, Roxanne really needed to get Kiki's attention; and so far all her attempts had failed.

Roxanne sighed quietly as Kiki pulled around a strand of her own hair and began studying that instead. Looking about herself, Roxanne saw that everyone else was avoiding looking directly at the bride or her two bridesmaids, except for one person. Roxanne began to smile as she locked eyes with the suited figure standing a short distance from them at the top of the altar. He nervously smiled back at her and it was all the encouragement Roxanne needed. She hurriedly slunk across the altar and smiled sweetly at Wally, who began to visibly sweat as his expression twisted nervously.

"Wally," she whispered, batting her eyelids at him. "I need your help with something…"

"I was afraid you might say that," Wally grumbled.

"Aw, Wally, you're the best!" Roxanne said cheerfully.

Wally hung his head and obediently followed Roxanne back across the altar to where Trixie stood, her veil hanging over her face, her body tense, her eyes fixed on something at the top of the church.

"Trixie?" Roxanne began carefully. "Wally and I were just talking, and we don't think Terry's gonna make it here today."

Roxanne waited for Trixie to respond, but her friend remained perfectly still, barely breathing and not even blinking.

"Trixie?" Roxanne tried again.

"Terry was on the island this morning, Trixie," Wally said gently. "He can't possibly get here in time for the wedding."

Trixie's eyes shifted to Wally and flickered a little. Roxanne took a sliding step back, but Wally, who was not as skilled at reading her expressions, stayed where he was, watching her expectantly. She slowly turned towards him and he smiled sympathetically as she faced him; but unfortunately Trixie did not see his actions as the kind gesture they were intended as.

"Do you think this is funny?" she roared, her words echoing around the pulpit. "You think it's funny that my wedding has been ruined?"

"N-no!" Wally said hurriedly.

He turned to Roxanne for support, but she had vanished. Turning the other way he saw a flash of green as Kiki fled the altar, leaving him alone to face Trixie's wrath.

"Damn you, Jacqueline McMadd!"

Wally yelped as Trixie began smacking him over the head with her bouquet. He tried to protect his head with his arms, but Trixie did not cease her assault until every flower in her bouquet had been demolished. She then tore off her veil and threw it at Roxanne, took off her shoes and threw them at Kiki and then gathered up her dress and ran back down the aisle.

"Wally, what the hell?" Roxanne yelled as the church doors banged shut behind Trixie.

"Yeah Wally, you should have been more sympathetic," Kiki added.

"Huh?" Wally squeaked, scratching his head in confusion, shreds of petals and foliage fluttering to the ground as he loosened them from his hair.

Roxanne started down the aisle and Kiki hurried after her, joining her as she reached the entrance hall of the church.

"Roxanne, wait!"

Roxanne paused, her hands hovering over the door handle.

"Yeah?" she asked, looking back over her shoulder at Kiki.

"I think Trixie might be best left alone for now," Kiki advised. "I think she's gonna be really, really upset right now, and things might get ugly if we go out there."

Roxanne shook her head.

"We're her friends," she said decisively. "Trixie was there for me during the Chojin Crown when I had problems with Kid, it's my duty to support her through this."

"I agree that we should support her, but maybe from a distance until she lets off some steam," Kiki said nervously.

Roxanne pulled a face at Kiki.

"What are you talking about?" she snorted. "Come on!"

Roxanne yanked open the door and marched outside, only to stumble to a halt halfway down the steps that led to the church grounds. Kiki hesitated in the doorway behind her, shrugging her shoulders when Roxanne looked back at her in alarm. Outside, Trixie was attempting to hit one of the hired limousines with a stick whilst two chauffeurs held her back and a third tried to make notes about the damage she had apparently caused before they had managed to stop her. She was writhing about in their hold and screaming out incoherent noises laced with the sort of language no person ought to be uttering in the vicinity of a church.

"She's going to get arrested, isn't she?" Roxanne muttered.

"Probably," Kiki said with a nod. "Which is why I'm going to be the friend who stays out of her way right now and bails her out later, rather than the friend who gets involved and ends up in the cell with her."

Roxanne chewed on her lip as she glanced back and forth between Trixie and Kiki, her mind considering Kiki's advice and debating which kind of friend she intended to be that day.

"Me too," she eventually concluded, retreating up the steps to join Kiki back inside the church.

Kiki quietly closed the door and, together with Roxanne, moved over to a nearby window to watch Trixie's struggle.

"This is awful," she said softly.

"I know, poor Trixie," Roxanne sighed. "Jacqueline McMadd's career is over after this. She did this to get the chair, but who the hell is gonna let her chair the IWF after this disaster?"

Kiki nodded her agreement, silently hoping that Roxanne was correct: after all, the thought of Jacqueline McMadd actually owning and running the IWF was quite terrifying.

* * *

"I like Eggs Benedict."

"Oh for fuck's sake."

"I also like Deviled Eggs."

"This is not a conversation about food, you stupid, fat bastard!"

"And scrambled eggs."

"What the… Would somebody please make him stop?"

"Sometimes pickled eggs. But I usually only eat those when I'm drunk."

Mars leapt up and grabbed his arms around Kevin's waist, digging his heels into the ground and barely managing to anchor Kevin down before his hands reached Kid Muscle's throat.

"This is not a conversation about eggs, you prick!" Kevin yelled, grabbing and clawing at the air in front of Kid's face.

"You said it was, Kev," Kid flatly replied. "You said some stuff about God, a good bang and the letter Y, then you told us today discussion day is all about eggs and stuff."

Kevin went limp in Mars's grip and Mars released him, only to cry out in alarm as Kevin threw himself at Kid, pinning him to the sand.

"You're driving me crazy!" he snarled, grabbing his hands around Kid's throat and shaking him back and forth.

Mars and Jaeger grabbed at Kevin and began pulling him back, but Terry and Dik Dik sat watching silently, smiling a little as Kid began to wheeze and suffocate under Kevin's grip.

"That arsehole has to go!" Kevin announced as Mars and Jaeger finally pulled him from Kid.

Mars and Jaeger kept dragging Kevin back until he was more than a body-length away from Kid, who began rubbing at his throat and coughing. Terry and Dik Dik remained where they were, their smiles widening a little as they watched Kid suffer.

"You said God, good bangs, the letter Y and eggs and stuff!" Kid said hoarsely, propping himself up on his elbows and frowning at Kevin.

"I said God, the big bang, the why of life and existentialism, you little fuckwit!" Kevin growled back.

"I'm still confused," Kid said, shaking his head. "There is no "Y" in "life"–"

"Not "Y" the letter, "why" the word!" Kevin snapped. "Look, forget what the note says at the beginning, the point was, they want us to talk about existentialism!"

"Eggs that stench and jism?" Kid said slowly. "Isn't that a bit weird? What to stinky eggs have to do with cu–"

"For fuck's sake Mantaro, I refuse to believe that you are this stupid! Nobody is this stupid! Existentialism! It's quite simple! Mars!"

"Huh?" Mars grunted.

"Explain to this twat what existentialism is."

Mars blinked owlishly at Kevin, who slowly felt a sinking feeling weigh him down.

"You don't know what it is either?" he asked quietly.

"Sure I do!" Mars said shaking his head. "I just ain't dat good at explainin' it. Why don't ya ask Jaeger?"

Kevin turned to Jaeger, who looked as confused as Mars had a moment earlier.

"Do any of you bottom-feeders know what existentialism is?" Kevin asked, looking around the others.

Kid picked his nose, Terry shook his head and Dik Dik shrugged indifferently.

"Sure," Meat offered, raising his hand. "Existentialism is the belief that every individual is in charge of their own destiny, and their lives weren't just created by a God or guided by fate or led by any sort of authority."

Kevin let out an involuntary noise of surprise at Meat's insight; he still looked like an escapee from a maximum-security mental hospital for the criminally deranged and yet his words were both correct and coherent.

"Right," he said quietly, before clearing his throat. "What Meat just said. They want us to discuss how we feel about that and if we agree."

"Dey want us to talk about religion?" Mars asked quietly.

"Not necessarily," Kevin said tugging his arms from Mars and Jaeger. "Just what you think your purpose in life is and how it came about."

"I ain't doin' dis."

Kevin turned with a frown, but Mars had already turning his back on him and started off.

"The hell is Birdo's problem?" Terry asked Kevin as he turned back to the group.

"I don't know," Kevin said, shaking his head.

"I believe in God," Dik Dik offered. "Life without a deity is pointless. If there is no afterlife, there is no point in this life whatsoever."

"I consider myself Agnostic, but I definitely believe in a God," Terry said.

"I believe zhere is a God," Jaeger said.

"I prefer cheese to eggs," Kid said with a nod. "Cheese is definitely my favourite dairy product."

"I believe staying on this island will either drive me insane or kill me," Kevin said darkly. "Either way, clearly there is no God, or else he would never have let this happen to me."

Kevin sighed and looked back over his shoulder, finding Mars sat a considerable distance from the others, writing something in the sand with his finger. Deciding that even if he had gone insane, Mars was still better company than the others on the island with him, Kevin turned towards him and started to walk.

"Kid, this is a discussion about destiny and fate," Terry said behind him.

"Well that's easy too," Kid said. "It's my destiny to be the best wrestler ever and it was my fate to marry Roxanne. Now I just have to beat Kevin at the next Chojin Crown and that's my life sorted."

"You're over-simplifying this," Dik Dik said.

"What would you know?" Kid snorted. "You're growing a tail!"

A mass of shouts and movement behind Kevin only reminded him that he had made the right decision, and he gladly sat down in front of Mars, craning his neck in an attempt to see what he was writing in the sand.

"I ain't havin' dat conversation," Mars muttered, his head still hung low, his eyes watching his finger lazily write nonsense in the sand.

"That's okay, neither is anybody else," Kevin assured him. "Least of all me. My opinion on the whole matter is the same as yours: there is no God, or any divine purpose for our existence, we have to chose our own way in life. I suppose I'm an existentialist, in essence."

"Dat ain't… I never said dat," Mars mumbled, his voice almost too low and quiet to be clearly audible.

"We had this conversation many times when we were in the DMP together," Kevin reminded him.

"I was hurtin' back den, dat ain't really how I feel," Mars said slowly. "I always lie when I'm hurtin' about somethin'."

"Okay… So what are you telling me now?"

"Nothin', I don't wanna talk about it."

"Okay."

"Okay."

Kevin cleared his throat and shifted uneasily, something about the look on Mars's face unsettling him more than it ought to.

"I suppose it is a bit personal," he tried. "But then again, putting our every actions on live, 24-hour broadcast around the world is quite personal too."

Mars nodded but otherwise remained silent. Beginning to feel really quite awkward – after all, Mars was not exactly the strong and silent type – Kevin looked back over his shoulder at the others, sweat-dropping as he saw that Kid was poking his finger at Dik Dik's rear-end whilst Terry insisted that there was evidence of a fluffy tail emerging from the point Kid was indicating. Jaeger was laughing so hard he had fallen over and Dik Dik was beginning to look furious. Meat was sat a short distance from them apparently counting pebbles and talking to himself.

But turning back to Mars, Kevin had to wonder if he was the last sane person on the island, as Mars did not look particularly mentally stable at that moment in time. Kevin sighed softly, looking up at the sky, where he could readily see two cameras flying over and the sphere that carried Doc Nakano and Mac Metaphor.

Kevin missed the silence and solitude of the Mask Estate.

"I miss the DMP," he grumbled. "Life was a lot simpler back then…"

* * *

**Next Chapter:** The task is set with the promise of a prize that seems too good to be true to those left on the island; although the prize is not without it's catches. Meanwhile, Terry grows suspicious of Mars and Kevin, and not without good reason... **Chapter 13 – Crap TV**.


End file.
